
EMERSON 

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Class 1*7S 

Book~F 5.1 

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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 


















THE 


UNITED STATES 


BY 

EMERSON DAVID FITE 

w 

FREDERICK FERRIS THOMPSON PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL SCIENCE 
IN VASSAR COLLEGE, AUTHOR OF “SOCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL 
CONDITIONS DURING THE CIVIL WAR ”, THE PRESI¬ 
DENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF I860”, “HISTORY 
OF THE UNITED STATES.’'* 



NEW YORK 

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 







Copyright, 1923, 

BY 

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 


First 'printing 


v 



PRINTED IN 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 


AUC31 '23 




"NfS \\* \ \ 


PREFACE 


co 

r* 

\ 

a 



The problem of the present volume is mainly one 
of emphasis. Many topics have been omitted entirely 
or given a subordinate position, in order to make more 
room for the essentials. Geographical exploration has 
been stressed, and the endeavor everywhere made to 
bring into prominence the gradual growth of geographi¬ 
cal knowledge concerning America. A separate chapter 
is devoted to the interesting but often neglected topic of 
exploration on the Pacific coast. 

Especial attention is given to the work of the leaders 
and to the occupations and modes of life both in the 
colonial and national periods. As an entirely new 
feature for books of this kind, a chapter is included on 
American plants and animals, in the belief that an 
understanding of man’s struggle with nature for exist¬ 
ence in the virgin fields and forests of America, is quite 
fundamental to understanding the later industrial life 
of the country and the wonderful development of 
America’s natural resources. The younger students of 
our history must be acquainted with the prevailing in¬ 
dustrial, social, and intellectual forces at every stage 
of the development of national life. 

In the treatment of wars the aim has been to enlarge 
upon and make clear a few important battles and cam¬ 
paigns, and to treat the remaining military events very 
briefly. The causes leading up to great upheavals have 
explained, but no large place has been given to the legal 


in 


iv PREFACE 

and constitutional discussions preceding the appeals to 
arms. 

The main topic is the people, and what they and 
their leaders have accomplished in the history of the 
nation. 

Great care as been exercised in the choice of illustra¬ 
tions and maps, to render this material valuable as well 
as interesting. While few will be in a position to avail 
themselves of all the helps at the ends of the chapters, it is 
hoped that all will find there some aids and suggestions 
of value. The section on “ Books to Remember ” is not 
included with any thought that young students will 
read very much in the volumes listed. If boys and 
girls do not read the great histories of the United States 
or the standard lives of the leaders, they at least ought 
to know what these books are, and where to go for de¬ 
tailed history if they wish it. Both teachers and pupils 
may derive benefit from the outline of the entire subject 
included at the end of the volume. 

E. D. F. 

Hanoum Inn, 

Thetford, Vermont. 

September, 1921. 


CONTENTS 


EXPLORATION AND SETTLEMENT 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. How the New World Became Known. 1 

II. The First Settlement. 24 

III. English and French Rivalry Outside 

New England. 54 

IV. American Plants and Animals .... 67 

THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 
DOWN TO THE QUARRELS WITH 
THE MOTHER COUNTRY 

V. The English and French Wars . . . 99 

VI. Life in the Colonies in 1763 .... 113 

QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER 
COUNTRY 

VII. Preliminary Quarrels with the 

Mother Country.134 

VIII. The War of Independence. 144 

THE FIRST YEARS UNDER THE 
CONSTITUTION 

IX. Adopting the Frame of Government . 179 

X. Immediate Success of the Consti¬ 
tution .188 

XI. Foreign Affairs 1793-1815 . 203 








VI 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 

XII. The Growth of the West (I) . . . . 220 

XIII. Four Centuries of Exploration on the 

Pacific Coast. 239 

NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT 

XIV. Domestic Politics. 255 

XV. Foreign Affairs 1815-1845 ...... 269 

XVI. Slavery and Territorial Expression . 281 

XVII. Growth of the West (II).293 

THE QUARREL OVER SLAVERY 

XVIII. Quarrels over Slavery in the Terri¬ 
tories . 308 

XIX. The Civil War. 327 

FROM THE CIVIL WAR TO THE 
SPANISH WAR 

XX. Political and Industrial Questions . 368 

A WORLD POWER 

XXI. The War With Spain. 395 

XXII. New Questions of International Im¬ 
portance . 405 

XXIII. Changes in Government. 415 

XXIV. The World War. 422 

XXV. Immigration and the New Citizenship 449 
List of Books Referred to in the 
Questions, Topics for Debate, etc. 461 

Topical Outline.• 465 

Index. 491 














« 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Christopher Columbus. 7 

The Ships of Columbus. 9 

Balboa Claiming the Pacific Ocean in the Name of Spain . . 12 

Sir Walter Raleigh. 26 

John Smith. 28 

Samuel de Champlain. 32 

The First Building in Quebec, 1608 . 32 

The Stadt Huys First City Hall in New York. 34 

Nieuw Amsterdam in 1650. 35 

The Brewster House, Scrooby, England. 40 

The First Thanksgiving Dinner. 41 

The Barker House at Pembroke, Mass., 1628 . 42 

Statue of Roger Williams. 43 

William Penn. 57 

King Cotton. 71 

Native Grapes, Tobacco, and Corn. 74 

Nuts, Fruits, and Vegetables in Early America. 76 

California Red Wood. 81 

The Buffalo Hunt. 85 

White-Tailed Deer in New York Zoological Garden. 86 

Beaver in New York Zoological Garden. 87 

Muskrat in New York Zoological Garden. 89 

Turkey in New York Zoological Garden. 94 

Quebec.109 

Colonial Stage Coach.114 

New York Harbor in 1717.116 

New York Harbor in 1717.117 

Daniel Boone.121 

Wharf Scene on a Southern Plantation.124 

George Washington’s Plantation at Mt. Vernon on the 

Potomac. 125 

vii 






























X 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 

John Mitchell.382 

The Battleship Maine Entering Havana Harbor.395 

The Maine Memorial . •.396 

Theodore Roosevelt.399 

The Peace Palace at The Hague.405 

Pan-American Building, Washington, D. C.407 

Woodrow Wilson.432 

General John J. Pershing.435 

Marshal Foch, Premier Clemenceau, Premier Lloyd-George, 

Premier Orlando and Foreign Minister Sonnino.438 

King George V of Great Britain greeting the captain of the 
army team at a baseball game played in London.440 












LIST OF MAPS 

PAGE 

The World as Known Before the Voyage of Colum¬ 
bus . 3 

The Columbus Map, showing America Connected 

with Asia. 10 

Waldseemiiller’s Great Map of 1507 . 11 

De Soto’s Expedition. 16 

Routes of Discoveries. 19 

Atlantic Discoveries . 20 

Early Virginia and Maryland. 29 

The Middle Colonies. 36 

Early New England. 38 

Rhode Island Colony. 44 

Connecticut Colony. 45 

The Western Hemisphere, by Henry Hondius, 

1630 47 

The West Indies in 1655 . facing page 50 

Atlantic Settlements. 55 

European Provinces, 1655 . facing page 56 

Joliet’s Map of New France .... facing page 62 

North America in 1713.101 

The British Colonies in 1760 105 

Siege of Quebec, 1759 . 108 

North America in 1763 . 110 

Seat of War in the West, 1775-1783 . 118 

The Thirteen American Colonies in 1775 

facing page 120 

Concord and Lexington.146 

Battle of Bunker Hill.147 

xi 
























Xll 


LIST OF MAPS 


PAGE 

Campaign in Middle States. 158 

Capture and Evacuation of Philadelphia .... 159 

Burgoyne’s Campaign. 160 

Revolution in the Southern States. 167 

The Yorktown Campaign. 168 

Main Movements of British Troops. 175 

The United States at the Peace of 1783 

facing page 176 

Operations Around Niagara Falls.211 

Operations Along the Canadian Border.213 

Operations Around Washington.214 

The Battle of New Orleans.216 

The Cumberland Road.225 

The Oregon Country.275 

Plan of Galveston Bay.276 

Territorial Growth of the United States 

facing page 280 

The Mexican War.286 

The Missions and Chapels of California .... 288 

Scott’s March to Mexico.289 

The Trails to Oregon and California.294 

The United States in 1860 .... facing page 326 

Part of Charleston Harbor.328 

Battle of Bull Run.332 

War Time Railroad Map of the Confederacy . . 333 

Chesapeake Bay.338 

Operations in the East.340 

Operations in the West.341 

New Orleans.342 

The Antietam Campaign.345 

The Gettysburg Campaign.348 

Field of Gettysburg Confederate Line.349 

The Vicksburg Campaign.351 



























LIST OF MAPS 


xm 


PAGE 

Murfreesboro to Atlanta.353 

The Battle of Chattanooga.355 

Sherman’s March.358 

Operations in Virginia.363 

Territorial Acquisitions of the United States 

facing page 392 

Hawaiian Islands.398 

Porto Rico.400 

Philippine Islands .402 

Eastern Front.426 

Western Front.427 

Italian Front. 431 

Western Front.437 

Immigration and New Citizenship.452 

Per Cent Distribution of Foreign-born Population, 

1910 454 

I * 




















THE UNITED STATES 


CHAPTER I 

HOW THE NEW WORLD 
BECAME KNOWN 

BEFORE COLUMBUS 

Introduction. — Five hundred years ago the people 
on one side of the earth knew nothing of the other side; 
in fact they did not know that there was another side. 
The continents of North and South America, with 
their fertile plains, mighty rivers, and rich store of 
timber, metals, and fur-bearing animals, were the abode 
only of savage or semi-savage peoples. Probably the 
native Americans, who looked out upon the waters of 
the Atlantic or of the Pacific, wondered little what 
there was bevond. But on the other side of the world, 
in Europe, man had reached a higher stage of civili¬ 
zation and would not be content leaving mysteries 
unsolved. The Europeans of the fifteenth century were 
in a period of unusual eagerness for learning, and 
when the ocean beckoned them to come and investi¬ 
gate its mysteries, they accepted the invitation. The 
history of the United States is just this coming of the 
civilized races of Europe over the ocean to the unused 
continent, their struggles here, and the gradual de¬ 
velopment of the country through the centuries. 

1 


2 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 

The motives that have led men across the water 
to explore and settle the new land, the ideas and ideals 
that have grown up with them, and the great leaders 
who have contributed their share to the making of 
the nation, are all matters for the American citizen 
of today to study, if he would know how his nation 
came to its present greatness. 

Claudius Ptolemy. — In the second century after 
Christ, Claudius Ptolemy, a Greek geographer, who lived 
in Alexandria, Egypt, gave to the world the most in¬ 
fluential book on geography ever written, and accom¬ 
panying it, a map of the world remarkable for the 
fact that it was based upon the theory that the earth 
was round instead of flat. In order to render it easier 
for his readers to locate places on the surface of 
the earth, to state directions and to measure distances 
between places, the author covered his map with a 
network of lines that characterize the maps of even 
the present day. These include the equator, parallels 
of latitude, and meridians of longitude. Ptolemy placed 
on his map the parts of the world then known, central 
and southern Europe and Asia, and northern Africa; 
but in his ignorance he did not include the north¬ 
ern parts of Europe and Asia, the southern parts 
of Africa, and the whole of North and South 
America. The mapmaker’s very failure to cover his 
whole globe suggested the incompleteness of man’s 
knowledge of the geography of the earth and challenged 
him to go forth and explore the unknown. 

Mediaeval Maps. — This challenge, however, was not 
at once accepted. After the days of Ptolemy, the 
greatness of Greece and Rome diminished, and the civili¬ 
zation of Europe fell into decay before the hordes of 


HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 3 


barbarians from the North. Ptolemy , and his map 
were forgotten. The maps made in this period of 
stagnation in the world’s history, lacking Ptolemy’s 
helpful lines, were shapless masses. One of them, 
made by Richard of Haldingham in England, in the 
latter part of the thirteenth century, shows the earth 
as a flat surface, with Jerusalem,, in Palestine, as the 
center of the world. There is not the least suggestion 



The World as Known Before the Voyage of Columbus 

on the map that the world is round, nor that Richard 
of Haldingham or any other man of his time had en¬ 
deavored to find out n4w facts about the geography of 
the earth’s surface. 

The Northmen. — Perhaps the first to make any dis¬ 
coveries in geography after Ptolemy were the Norse 
sea-rovers, who sailed to the countries surrounding the 
Baltic Sea, to Iceland, and even to Greenland about 
the vear 1,000 a.d. and later. Not much is known 

K/ / 

about these old voyages, but it is certain that Green- 
















4 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 


land began to find a place on the maps of Northern 
Europe considerably before the days of Columbus. 
Some scholars affirm that the Norsemen discovered 
America. They point out that the same Norse sagas 
or tales that speak of Greenland in these early times, 
mention also other regions that were reached by the 
Norsemen on the west and south of that land. Such 
regions would necessarily be the mainland of North 
America, and as they are not far distant from Green¬ 
land, it does not seem improbable that the men of 
Northern Europe actually reached the American con¬ 
tinent before the days of Columbus. According to the 
sagas, Leif Ericson discovered the new lands in the west 
in the year 1,000 a.d. 

It is a question whether or not Columbus himself 
knew of these maps and received inspiration and sug¬ 
gestion from them. But there is no doubt that culti¬ 
vated men and women in southern Europe of his 
day, knew of them; and Columbus probably saw 
them. Without a doubt he knew of the sea tales of the 
sagas. 

Marco Polo. — The next venture into the bounds of 
Ptolemy’s unknown regions was made by a Venetian 
traveller, Marco Polo. He travelled overland from 
Europe to China and the adjacent countries just after 
the year 1250, and his voyage put these eastern parts 
of Asia, Japan, and the many surrounding islands on 
the map for the first time. Another result of his ex¬ 
plorations, perhaps the most important, was the proof 
that Polo gave to the world that there was an ocean 
east of Asia. 

The Portuguese. — Other additions to geographical 
knowledge were made in the southern parts of Africa 


HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 5 


by the Portuguese mariners of the fifteenth century, 
under the patronage of Prince Henry the Navigator, 
the son of the King of Portugal. These brave seamen 
had full confidence in the old Greek geographers, who 
taught that the world was spherical and that the land 
was surrounded on all sides by water. They knew, too, 
the old Greek stories, that at least two different parties 
in ancient times, starting in Asia, had sailed around 
Africa to the waters of the Atlantic long before the 
days of the Christian era. So the Portuguese hoped 
that they might be able to rediscover the same way 
around Africa in the opposite direction, from Europe 
to Asia. 

The Commercial Triumphs of the Portuguese. — The 

Portuguese, especially after the capture of Constanti¬ 
nople by the Turks in 1453, were impelled also by 
the commercial necessity of finding a new route to the 
Spice Islands, which lay off the southeastern coast of 
Asia. Here Europeans had long been accustomed to 
buy their silks, gems, and drugs, as well as great quan¬ 
tities of spices which they used to cover up rancid 
tastes and smells in their food, for refrigerators and cold 
storage were then altogether unknown. The merchants 
of the cities of northern Italy had grown very rich by 
importing the far-away products to the cities of west¬ 
ern Europe. The route to the East over the Black and 
Caspian Seas, controlled by Genoa, was closed when 
the Turks conquered Constantinople in 1453, while 
the route over the Euphrates River and the Red Sea, 
controlled by Venice, remained open for only a few 
years more. 

The Portuguese Circumnavigate Africa. — Ever more 
bold in their southern voyages from year to year, the 


6 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 


Portuguese reached the equator on the west coast of Af¬ 
rica in 1471, and in 1486, rounded the “ Cape of Good 
Hope/’ on Africa’s southern point. With this triumph 
to encourage them, their zeal and confidence that they 
would at last come to the Spice Islands in this way 
were redoubled. Success came in 1498, when Vasco da 
Gama reached the eastern markets, at Calicut, on the 
west coast of India. The present name of the fabric, 
calico, is derived from this old town in India, where 
da Gama filled his ships with the goods of the East. 


CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 

Christopher Columbus’s Dream. — A young Italian 
sailor, Christopher Columbus, native of the city of 
Genoa- in northern Italy, was destined to immortalize 
himself by making the greatest geographical discovery 
in the history of the world. He had the advantage 
of knowing all about Ptolemy’s ideas on geography, 
and he accepted the old Greek belief that the world 
was round. He was stirred, too, by Marco Polo’s 
story of a sea to the east of Asia. He reasoned that 
if the earth was round and if there was a sea on the 
east of Asia, the Asiatic coasts could be reached by 
sailing westward from Europe. If in fact the maps 
of northern parts of Europe and of the North Atlantic 
came to his attention, Columbus must have reasoned 
that he, too, like the Northmen, might find lands in 
the west. But in his case it was the rich lands of 
Japan, described by Marco Polo, and not the barren 
Greenland, that attracted him. The growing distances 
reached by the Portuguese around Africa before 1492 
must have inspired Columbus with the thought that 


HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 7 

long voyages over the ocean, which had never been 
attempted till the voyages of the Portuguese, were 
possible after all. 

The Sea a Place of Horror. — Down to that time 
the ocean depths had been thought of by men and 
women as abounding in every kind of horrible monsters. 
The common sailors had been the victims of the 



Christopher Columbus 


most awful superstitions concerning the sea, and had 
been afraid to sail far away from the land. The Portu¬ 
guese seamen and Columbus and his men deserve great 
credit for embarking on long voyages in spite of these 
beliefs. 

Columbus Sets Out. — Columbus determined to test 
the theory that the world was round by sailing west¬ 
ward over the Atlantic and trying to find the con¬ 
tinent of Asia in that direction. It proved to be very 







8 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 


expensive to build ships and to equip them. The kings 
of Portugal, of France, and of England, to whom he 
applied in turn for financial assistance, turned him 
away. Finally, by the help of Queen Isabella of Spain, 
and of the seaport town of Palos, Spain, he got to¬ 
gether three ships, and in these he set out from Palos 
with ninety men on a lucky Friday, August 3, 1492. 
Columbus himself sailed in the flagship, the Santa 
Maria. 

His Four Voyages. — The weather proved fair and 
the voyage easy, yet the superstitious and cowardly 
sailors, out of sight of land for days with nothing but 
the waste of waters surrounding them, became terrified 
and demanded to go back. Only the leader’s heart 
was strong. On another lucky Friday, October 12. 
land was discovered, which the devout Columbus named 
San Salvador or Holy Saviour, one of the Bahama Is¬ 
lands, but which one is not known. Cuba and Hayti 
and other large islands of the group now known as the 
West Indies, were also found on this first voyage. 
On a second, in 1493-1494, Columbus established a 
colony in Hayti; on a third, in 1498, he explored the 
coast of northern South America; and on a fourth, in 
1502, skirted the coast of Central America. 

Columbus’s Belief that He had reached Asia. — Co¬ 
lumbus believed that he had been in the waters ad¬ 
joining Asia, and that the large continental mass, now 
called South America but bv Columbus known as 
“ Mondo Novo ” (New World), was connected with 
Asia. The accompanying map by the two Columbus 
brothers, Christopher and Bartholemew, clearly shows 
this. On his first voyage, thinking that he was in 
“ Cipango ” (Japan) and that “ Cathay ” (China) was 


HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 9, 



The Ships of Columbus 



















































10 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 


not far off, the leader sent off an interpreter to deliver 
to the ruler of the latter country a letter from the 
Spanish sovereigns, Ferdinand and Isabella. In a letter, 
which he wrote in 1503 concerning his fourth voyage. 
Columbus indicated that he still believed that he had 
been in the neighborhood of China. 

Americus Vespucius and the Naming of America.— 
Amerieus Vespucius-, another Italian seaman in the 
service of Spain, made four voyages along the shores 
of South America. As a result of certain of his letters, 



which were widely published and became very popu¬ 
lar, the world came to look upon him as the discoverer of 
a new continent. Columbus was credited with the 
discovery of only a few islands off the coast. Martin 
Waldseemiiller, a German professor in a French col¬ 
lege at St. Die, suggested that the new continent be 
called America, in Vespucius’s honor. The professor 
intended no discredit to Columbus, for on a great map 
of the world of the year 1507, which was the first map 
to show the name America, across South America, Wald- 










HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 11 


Wald see muller’s Great Map of 1507. The Western Half 

seemiiller wrote of the present South America as a 
“ land, discovered by Columbus, a captain of the King 
of Spain, and by Americus Vespucius, both men of 
very great ability.” 

The pleasant sounding name, America, suggested by 
the greatest geographical authority of the time, was 



tWMiMB HI 1 










♦SCVKfcv** KfWStmr TM 


imhi 
















12 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 


in common use in a few years for South America; and 
shortly for North America also. 


OTHER SPANISH VOYAGES 

The Spanish Claim to America. The Line of De¬ 
marcation. — The monarchs of Spain looked to the 
explorations of Columbus to sustain their claim to the 
whole of North and South America. Although the 



Balboa Claiming the Pacific Ocean in the 
Name of Spain 


claim was excessive and although disputes were bound 
to arise over it with Portgual and other rival nations, 
the Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, wdio was 
appealed to for a decision in the matter, decided in 
Spain’s favor. By a famous proclamation, the head 
of the Church drew an imaginary line from pole to 
pole in the Atlantic Ocean, assigning to Spain all the 
lands and seas west of this line, which included all 
of America except the eastern strip of Brazil, and to 

































HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 13 


Portugal all east of it. The other nations quite nat¬ 
urally took the ground that there was enough new 
territory in America for all, and calmly disregarded 
the Pope’s line of demarcation. 

Discovery of the Pacific Ocean. — The Pacific Ocean 
was discovered by a Spaniard named Balboa while 
searching for gold on the Isthmus of Panama. Here 
Balboa learned from the natives that he was traversing a 
narrow neck of land and that a great sea lay beyond. 
The discovery was dramatic in the extreme. Guided 
by Indians and followed by a band of picked men, 
Balboa made his way through an almost impenetrable 
forest until he believed that the moment of discovery 
was at hand. Then his men were halted while he went 
ahead to high ground, that he might first behold the 
great view alone. As the isthmus here runs east and 
west, he appropriately called the waters which he beheld 
from this height, the South Sea. Several days more of 
hard marchin&d^rought him and his party to the very 
ocean side, where Balboa advanced proudly into the 
water and took possession of the sea and all the lands it 
washed for the King of Spain. Later he made the first 
suggestion of an Atlantic-Pacific Canal over the Isthmus. 
Four years earlier, when Columbus was on his fourth 
voyage, the natives had disclosed to him the nearness of 
the southern sea; but he turned back. 

The Spaniards in Mexico. — The Spaniards paid 
little attention to the eastern seaboard of North Amer¬ 
ica, where they found no gold or other precious metals. 
Under Ponce cle Leon they made a fruitless search in 
Florida for a fountain of perpetual youth, a drink of 
the waters of which they hoped would restore one’s 
youth forever; and they made several other unsuccess- 


14 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 

ful expeditions along the same shores. In Mexico it 
was different, for here they found great quantities of 
gold and silver and a very interesting civilization. 
Cortez conquered the country of the Mexicans with a 
small band of followers in 1519-1521. His treatment 
of the natives was cruel in the extreme. 

An Early Account of Mexico. — In 1544 Sebastian 
Cabot drew an interesting map of the world, on which 
there is an inscription describing Mexico in the fol¬ 
lowing words: “This mainland, which the Spaniards 
named New Spain, the most illustrious gentleman, Don 
Fernando Cortez, Marquis del Valle de Guaxacon, con¬ 
quered. There are, in this land, provinces and cities 
innumerable; the chief of*them is the city of Mexico, 
which contains more than fifty thousand inhabitants; 
it is in a salt lake which extends over forty leagues. 
There is, in the said city, and in all the other provinces, 
much gold, silver, and all kinds of precious stones; 
and there is produced in the said la and provinces 
much good silk, and cotton alum, orchil, dyewood, 
cochineal, and saffron, and sugar, with which many 
ships come loaded to these kingdom^ of Spain. The 
natives of this land are very expert in all that relates 
to trade; instead of coins, they make use of certain m 
kernels, split in halves, which they call cacoa. They 
have much wheat and barley, and many other grains, 
and vines, and fruits of different kinds. It is a land 
of many animals, deer, mountain boars, lions, leopards, 
tigers, and much other game, both birds and land ani¬ 
mals. It is a people very skillful in moulding any 
object after nature, and in painting pictures. The 
women usually adorn themselves with precious stones 
and valuable pearls. These Indians use a certain kind 


HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 15 


of paper, on which they draw what they wish to ex¬ 
press with figures (pictures) instead of letters. They 
never had peace among themselves; on the contrary, 
some persecuted others, in continuous fights in which 
the prisoners on either side were sacrificed by their 
enemies to their gods, and their dead bodies were given 
to the army at public banquets. They were idolaters, 
and adored whatever took their fancy; they were very 
fond of eating human flesh, whereas now they have 
laid aside these fierce and cruel customs, and have 
clad themselves in Jesus Christ, believing heartily in 
our holy evangelical faith, and obeying our most holy 
mother church and its most holy precepts.” 

The Spaniards in Peru. — Another small Spanish 
army conquered Peru, on the west coast of South 
America, in 1533. Concerning this country and its na¬ 
tive inhabitants the Cabot map of 1544 contains the fol¬ 
lowing: “ These provinces were discovered by the hon¬ 
ored and valiant gentleman, Francisco Pizarro, who 
was the governor of them during his life; in which 
there is infinite gold and silver, and mines of very fine 
emeralds. The bread which they have they make of 
maize, and the wine likewise; they have much wheat and 
other grain. It is a warlike race; they use, in their wars, 
bows, and slings, and lances, and their arms are of 
gold and silver. There are in the said provinces cer¬ 
tain sheep of the form of small camels; they have very 
small wool. They are an idolatrous people, and of very 
subtle mind; and on all the sea-coast, and for more 
than twenty miles inland it never rains. It is a 
very healthy land. The Christians have made many 
settlements in it, and continually keep increasing 
them.” 


16 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 


The Spaniards in the Interior of North America.— 

The Spaniards, seeking for gold, were greatly disap¬ 
pointed in the results of their expeditions into the 
interior of North America. From one of these expedi¬ 
tions, which was shipwrecked in the Gulf of Mexico, 
four survivors reached the Pacific Ocean, and reported 
strange tales of hunch-backed cows (buffaloes) on the 
plains of the interior, and of stone houses, the pueblos 
of the Zuni Indians. Inspired by these tales, another 



De Soto’s Expedition 


traversed the present Gulf States of the United States 
and even crossed the Mississippi, but found nothing 
of value. The little army of this expedition, led by 
de Soto, who has passed down in history as the dis¬ 
coverer of the Mississippi River, was fearfully harassed 
by battles with the natives. 

Coronado in the Southwest. — A third expedition, 
under Coronado, which set out from the city of Mexico, 











HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 17 


came to the pueblos of the Zunis, the Colorado River, 
and the plains of the middle of what is now the United 
States. 

Concerning the discovery of the Colorado River and 
its grand canons, one who was with Coronado wrote 
as follows: “After they had gone twenty days they 
came to the banks of the river, which seemed to be 
more than three or four leagues in an air-line across 
to the other bank of the stream, which flowed between 
them. The country was elevated and full of low, 
twisted pines, very cold, and lying open toward the ’ 
north, so that, this being the warm season, no one 
could live there on account of the cold. They spent 
three days on this bank looking for a passage down 
to the river, which looked from above as if the water 
was six feet across, although the Indians said that 
it was half a league wide. It was impossible to descend.” 

Coronado on the Great Plains West of the Mississippi. 
— “ Quivira,” an Indian town found by Coronado 
somewhere in the present state of Kansas or Nebraska, 
was described by an old authority, as reached “ through 
mighty plains, and sandy heaths, so smooth and weari¬ 
some, and bare of wood, that they made heaps of ox 
dung for want of stones and trees, that they might not 
lose themselves at their return; for three horses were lost 
on that plain and one Spaniard, which went from his 
company on hunting. All the way the plains are as 
full of crooked-backed oxen, as the mountain Serena 
in Spain is of sheep .... Quivira is in forty degrees; 
it is a temperate country, and hath very good waters, 
and much grass, plums, mulberries, nuts, melons, and 
grapes, which ripen very well. There is no cotton; and 
they apparel themselves with ox-hides and deer skins.” 


18 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 

Permanent Spanish Settlements in North America. — 

A few struggling settlements were made by the Span¬ 
iards in the southern part of the present United States, 
among them St. Augustine in Florida in 1565. This 
was the first permanent European settlement in the 
United States. In about forty years more the Spaniards 
settled Santa Fe in New Mexico. 

Magellan’s Circumnavigation of the Globe. — Co¬ 
lumbus’s first venture is the most celebrated voyage 
in the history of the world. Second to it in geograph- 
• ical importance is the voyage of Ferdinand Magellan, 
a Portuguese in the service of Spain, who was the first 
man to sail around the world. He set out from Spain 
in 1519. His first great feat was the finding of the 
strait now named for him at the southern tip of 
South America. Through this it took him five weeks 
to pass. It was a still greater feat to sail across the 
mighty Pacific, and be the first man to cross this great¬ 
est waste of waters. The remarkable voyage proved 
that the earth was round, since one of Magellan’s 
vessels, the Victoria, got back to its starting point in 
Spain by a continuous voyage to the west. The leader 
himself was killed in the Philippine Islands, but the 
Spice Islands, the goal of the endeavor, were reached 
by the survivors. A shipload of cloves and a few 
samples of other spices were carried back to Europe. 


THE CLAIM OF OTHER NATIONS TO NORTH 

AMERICA 

The English Claim. — The English advanced a claim 
to North America, based on the voyages of the two 
Italians in their service, John Cabot, and Sebastian, 


HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 19 


his son. These two explorers reported in 1497 and 1498 
that they had discovered the mainland of China seven 
hundred leagues west of England, and had coasted 
along this land for three hundred leagues. Their voy¬ 



ages, about which little is known, were widely cele¬ 
brated in England, where it was believed that it was 
the mainland of North America that the Cabots had 
reached. About a century elapsed before England at¬ 
tempted to take .advantage of these discoveries. 


















20 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 



Description of Labrador. 

-— An inscription on the 
Cabot map of 1544 speaks 
as follows of the lands which 
Sebastian 
Cabot and his 
father had dis¬ 
covered: “The 
people of this 
land are 
dressed in the 
skins of ani¬ 
mals. They 
use in their 
wars bows and 
arrows, lances 
and darts, and 
certain clubs 
of wood, and 
slings. It is a 




A CAPE BRETON I, 


John Cabot, 
1497 . 


very 

There 


many 

and 


stags 


and 


Ponce de Leon 
1512 


A • :. 


SCALE OF MILES 


0 ]00 200 


sterile land, 
are on it 
white bears, 
many large 
like horses, 
many other 
animals; and like¬ 
wise there is infinite 
fish, sturgeon, salm¬ 
on, very large soles, 
a yard in length, 
and many other 
kinds of fish; and 
the greatest 
quantity of 
them is called 
codfish (bac- 
callaos). And 
likewise there 
are in the 
same land 


Atlantic Discoveries 

























HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 21 

hawks, which are as black as crows, eagles, partridges, 
linnets, and many other kinds of birds of different 
species.” Probably this was somewhere in the vicinity 
of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. 

The French Claim. The Fishermen. — Almost as 
valuable in Europe as the spices, drugs, and gems of 
the Spice Islands of the East, was sea-food, from what¬ 
soever quarter of the globe derived. To the Europeans 
of the time, loyal members of the Roman Catholic 
Church, who were prohibited from eating meat on the 
many Church holidays and festivals, the announcement 
of the discovery of abundant new fishing grounds was 
extremely welcome. French fishermen found America’s 
greatest fishing grounds, the Grand Banks off Newfound¬ 
land, in 1504; and in every succeeding year they came 
there in increasing numbers. This was the foundation 
of France’s claim to territory in America. 

The French Claim. Verrazano and Cartier. — Not 
long after, a great French expedition, under the com¬ 
mand of the Italian, Verrazano, forged the second link 
in the French claim to North America, by sailing along 
the eastern coast from the Carolinas to Maine. Ver¬ 
razano discovered the Hudson River, which he described 
as “ an exceeding great stream of water, which within 
the mouth was very deep, and from the sea to the mouth 
of the same, with the tide which we found to rise eight 
feet, any great ship laden may pass up.” A decade 
later, another Frenchman, Jacques Cartier, made ex¬ 
tensive explorations in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and 
along the St. Lawrence River. 

The Portuguese Claim. — In the year 1500 a Portu¬ 
guese expedition under the command of Pedro Cabral, 
on its way down the w r est coast of Africa to the Spice 


22 HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 

Islands of the East, was driven by storms to the coast 
of Brazil. With the exception of one short interval, 
the Portuguese maintained their hold here till the nine¬ 
teenth century. In the same year, farther north, an¬ 
other Portuguese, Gaspar Cortereal, reached the islands 
in the vicinity of Newfoundland. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. What great voyages on the sea were made before Colum¬ 
bus? Did Columbus know of these? What aid did he receive 
from each ? Did Columbus know about Ptolemy and his map ? 
Do you believe in the discovery of America by the Northmen? 
Why? Why are the names of Prince Henry the Navigator 
and of da Gama to be remembered in connection with 
Columbus? 

2. Mention various reasons why we consider Columbus a 
great man? Was Columbus superstitious? What arguments 
can you give that the world is round? Why did Columbus 
believe that he had reached Asia? Explain why the new 
world was not named after Columbus. Was Waldseemiiller a 
detractor of Columbus? 

3. On what did the Spaniards base their claim to North 
America? Who was Balboa? What was Indian life in Mexico 
like, when the Spaniards arrived there? Who were the more 
civilized, the Indians of Mexico or of Peru? Why do you 
think so? Were the Spaniards^ good explorers? Where do 
you think “ Quivira ” was? Why? Give name and date of 
settlement of the oldest European settlement in North America. 
Compare Columbus with Magellan? Did they have any quali¬ 
ties in common? What? 

4. Compare the Indians of Labrador with those of Mexico 
and of Peru? Which were the less advanced in civilization? 
Why? Were the Italians and Portuguese greater explorers 
than the Spaniards? Why? On what did the English, the 
French, and the Portuguese base their claims to parts of 
North America? 


HOW THE NEW WORLD BECAME KNOWN 23 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That Magellan was a greater explorer than 
Columbus. 

2. Resolved, That Spain’s claim to North America was 
better than that of England. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Imagine yourself back in Columbus’s day, and write 
on what he thought of the explorers who lived before him? 

2. Consider that you had accompanied Columbus on his 
first voyage, and describe to your friends what you saw. 

3. The part played by Italians in the early discoveries in 
America. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Columbus’s letter concerning his first voyage. Hart, 
Source Book, 103: Hart, Colonial Children, 4. 

2. Magellan’s experiences on his great voyage. Halsey, 
Epochs, I, 82-92; McMurray, Pioneers on Land and Sea. 

Important Dates 

1492. Discovery of America 

1513. Discovery of the Pacific Ocean 

Books to Remember 

1. Edward Channing, United States. 

2. John Fiske, Discovery of America . 


CHAPTER II 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 

PRELIMINARY ENGLISH VOYAGES 

Introduction. — The expeditions of the Cabots, and 
the voyages of the French fishermen and of Verrazano 
and Cartier had laid the foundations of the claims of 
England and of France to the eastern coast of North 
America; but for about a hundred years these two 
nations made no attempt to follow up these first voyages 
and render their title to thecontinent good by actual 
settlement. For a large part of this time the people 
of Europe were engaged in wars over the establishment 
of Protestant churches, after Martin Luther and the 
other leaders of the Protestant Reformation broke 
away from the Roman Catholic Church. To wage 
these wars the nations of Europe found that all their 
resources were needed at home; they had no energy to 
spare on colonization abroad. Alone of the great powers, 
Spain dared to send colonizing expeditions to America 
in this period, for example the great expeditions that 
conquered and held Mexico and Peru. In her case this 
was not a scattering of energies but rather an assem¬ 
bling of the sinews of war. The gold and silver of 
Mexico and Peru supported her and made her great. 
So jealously did she guard her treasures in the new 
world that the other nations could not, without great 

24 


V 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


25 


naval and military forces, successfully start settlements 
there, until the power of Spain was swept from the sea. 

The Northeast and the Northwest Passages. — Eng¬ 
land was cautious. She decided to make a raid on the 
Spice Islands of the East, which were the richest store¬ 
houses of the time, next to the Mexican and Peruvian 
mines. She sought to accomplish this over a route that 
would be reasonably safe from the power of the Spanish 
navy. First, she struck into the waters north of Europe 
and Asia, hoping to reach the Pacific and its islands by 
that northeast route. Second, she set out toward the 
Pacific and the spice treasures via the waters north of 
North America. Both movements depended for success 
upon the correctness of the teaching of the ancient 
Greeks and Romans that the continental land masses of 
the earth’s surface were surrounded on all sides by water. 
Both seemed reasonable efforts in view of the Portuguese 
and Spanish successes in finding water routes south of 
Africa and South America. From 1550 to 1600, literally 
scores of English vessels sought the Northeast and the 
Northwest Passages. Spanish vessels offered no inter¬ 
ference, but arctic ice invariably turned back the “ mer¬ 
chant adventurers.” In the cold of the northern regions, 
hardships of the seas such as Columbus and his men had 
never dreamed of were suffered unflinchingly. English 
vessels kept up the quest for three centuries, restlessly 
seeking advantages in world trade that were at last 
to make England great, after the Spice Islands and the 
Mexican and Peruvian gold ceased to lure. It was not 
until almost the present day that the passages were 
found, but when found they proved to be impracticable 
for commercial purposes. Nordenskiold went through 
the Northeast Passage from west to east in the Vega 


26 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


1878-1879, and Amundsen through the Northwest Pas¬ 
sage in the Gjoa from east to west 1903-1904. 

Preliminary English Voyages to America. — Eng¬ 
land made no extensive attempts either at colonization 
or exploration in North America until she had measured 
her strength with the Spanish sea power. Frobisher 
and Davis, soon after 1575, each made preliminary 



Sir Walter Raleigh 

attempts to find the Atlantic entrance to the Northwest 
Passage north of Labrador, far away from the Spaniards 
in the south. Gilbert, at about the same time, lost his 
life trying to set up a settlement in Newfoundland, at 
what he judged would be the entrance to the desired 
passage. No result was achieved by any of these men. 
Raleigh, too, more persistent than others, followed with 
four different attempts at founding settlements in the 
present country of North Carolina, but he met with 







THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


27 


failure. It seemed impossible to get ships together in 
expeditions and adequately equip them with men and 
supplies, so long as there was any menace from the 
Spanish fleet. 

Destruction of the Spanish Fleet. — Then came the 
expedition known as the Spanish Armada against 
England in 1588, the largest fleet ever assembled in the 
world’s history to that time. Spain was determined to 
crush its rivals and to maintain her monopoly in 
America. The fate of England, her aspirations to sea 
power, commercial expansion, and a possible -colonial 
empire in America, all were at stake. By the daring 
and the practical seamanship of her sailors she emerged 
from the conflict a victor. Her dreams of colonial ex¬ 
pansion in America and of new world trade could now 
be carried out, with no fear from Spain. All Spain’s 
rivals, in fact, were free each to make a grab for a slice 
of North America, as each could. In the ensuing grand 
scramble for the best lands, North America was carved 
up among the great powers of Europe, much as Africa 
and China have been partitioned in our own day. All 
this was made possible by the fact that the Spanish fleet 
had been overwhelmed in one great sea fight. The in¬ 
fluence of the new sea power of England was destined to 
change the whole face of the western civilization. 

Fierce international rivalries for colonies in America 
broke out, those between England and France being 
the most important. Between these two powers the 
rivalry was to last longer and to be more intense 
than the old rivalry between England and Spain. 
Ultimately English and French armies and navies fought 
one another in six great wars, all of which were con¬ 
cerned with colonial affairs in one way or another. 


28 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


THE ENGLISH COLONY OF VIRGINIA 

The First Settlement. — The King of England 

granted two charters, or sets of privileges, in the year 
1606, one to the London Company and one to the Ply¬ 
mouth Company. His thought was that the combined 
energies and capital of a large number of England’s 



John Smith 


leading business men would be more likely to succeed 
in colonizing America than expeditions backed by a 
single man, like those of Raleigh. Under the former 
company the first permanent English settlement was 
made in the year 1607, on a peninsula, then almost an 
island, in the James or Powhatan River, in Virginia, 
thirty-eight miles from the sea. The site was called 







THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


29 


Jamestown in honor of the king. Almost every trace of 
the town has since disappeared, and the unfortunate site 
is now an island in the river. The fever from the 
swamps surrounding the new settlement reaped an 
appalling harvest of human lives. 

Captain John Smith. — The strongest man in the 
little colony was Captain John Smith, the president 
of the governing council of the colony. By his energy 
and force he got hard work 
out of the “ gentlemen,” 
who had accompanied 
the expedition for com¬ 
mercial profit and adven¬ 
ture, even though their 
positions in life till then 
had led them to scorn 
everything that looked like 
manual labor. He was 
skillful too in making 
friends of the Indians and 
inducing them to furnish 
his men with corn. After 
two long exploring expedi¬ 
tions in open boats, cover¬ 
ing a period of three 
months, he drew a remarkable map of Virginia between 
the James and the Potomac, which is today still cited 
as an authority. One notices on this map Chesapeake 
Bay (“ Chesapiack ”), the Potomac River (“ Patow- 
mac ”), the Pamunkey (“ Pamaunk ”), the James River 
(“Powhatan”), and the Chickahominy (“ Cliicka- 
hamma ”) ; and the seat of King “ Powhatan ” at “ The 
Fales ” on the “ Powhatan,” that is, the present Rich- 























30 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


mond. Here Smith got corn from the Indians, and here, 
as a captive, he first saw the Indian princess, Poca¬ 
hontas. Smith says that he named Cape Charles and 
Cape Henry at the entrance to the James in honor of 
the heirs of King James of England. “ Poynt Comfort ” 
was so named because it put the settlers in “ Good com¬ 
fort ” to find a fair landing place on the opposite shore 
after their rough voyage from England. 

Belief in the Proximity of the Pacific Ocean. — The 
English settlers in Virginia and then later in the other 
parts of the seaboard believed for three-quarters of a 
century that the great western sea was very near. Smith 
put it at “ 4 or 5 daies Journey ”, another at “ about ten 
daies, allowing, according to a march, some fourteen or 
sixteen miles a day.” They believed that the rivers 
that flowed west from the Appalachian Mountains, now 
known to empty into the Mississippi River in the in¬ 
terior of a mighty continent, reached this western sea. 

The Northwest Passage. — Smith and his contem¬ 
poraries in Virginia also believed in the Northwest Pas¬ 
sage. Smith sought for it whenever he entered a creek 
or inlet in his geographical expeditions. The strait is 
laid down on many a map of the time. One of these 
maps has the following interesting touch, “ It is like¬ 
wise claimed that wrecked Chinese ships have been 
seen in the North American Sea.” 

Slavery in Virginia. — In the year 1619, Dutch 
traders, unloaded black slaves from Africa on the shores 
of Virginia, and thus began African slavery in the 
confines of what was to be the United States of America. 
The new system of labor spread slowly, and for many 
years there were more white than black slaves in the 
colony of Virginia and in the other English colonies. 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


31 


Quite commonly poor whites paid their transportation 
charges to America by binding themselves to a form 
of forced labor for a term of years. These men were 
called “ indentured servants.” 

The House of Burgesses. — This earliest English 
colony in America is famous for its successful experi¬ 
ment in popular law-making. In 1619, the year of the 
coming of the African slaves, twenty-two men came 
together in the church at Jamestown from the nine 
surrounding towns and plantations, to make the laws 
of the colony. This beginning of popular government 
in America, though originating not with the colonists 
but with the London Company itself as a gift to its 
settlers, was an epoch-making event. The idea, which 
had already made some slight progress in Europe, spread 
throughout the future English colonial empire in 
America, and is today the foundation of the present 
state governments and of the national government of 
the United States. In 1625 the King took the colony 
under his own control, but still allowed the representa¬ 
tive assemblv. 

%/ 

Jealous Spain. — The presence of the English on the 
James was looked upon by the Spaniards in Florida as 
an encroachment on their territory, and was very gall¬ 
ing to them. In her weakness, however, Spain could do 
nothing. France and the other nations did not object 
so much to England’s bold step. France herself was 
already busy on the American shore a little farther 
north. 


32 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


INTERNATIONAL RIVALRY OVER NEW ENGLAND 

French Explorations. — The French made their first 
permanent settlement in America at Port Royal, in 



Samuel de Champlain 


Nova Scotia, in 1605. From this general center their 
great explorer, Samuel de Champlain, coasted along the 



The First Building in Quebec, 1608 


shores of New England three different summers before 
the English arrived in Virginia. His account of his ex- 






THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


33 


periences along the new coast is exceedingly interesting. 
He wrote a perfect description of Mount Desert Island. 
From the mouth of the Kennebec River he beheld the 
White Mountains; he saw the islands of Boston harbor; 
entered and named the “ Port de Cap St. Louis/’ the 
site of the later Plymouth; gave to the present Cape 
Cod the name “ Cap Blanc,” or White Cape, because of 
its white sands and dunes; and reached the present 
Martha’s Vineyard. 

In later voyages Champlain founded Quebec in 1608 
near a settlement made previously by Cartier in 1535 
and then abandoned. The next year he discovered the 
lake that now bears his own name, and in two more years 
made a settlement at Montreal. He was the first 
white man to see Lake Ontario, Lake Huron, and Lake 
Oneida. Champlain was great as governor, explorer, 
naturalist, engineer, and mapmaker. His maps are 
far superior to those by John Smith. He was the 
head of the French settlements in Canada, under the 
title of lieutenant governor, till his death in 1635. 

Dutch Explorations. — After Holland by treaty with 
Spain in 1607 came into the possession of the Spice 
Islands, which Spain herself had then but recently taken 
from the Portuguese, the Dutch started in to build a 
colonial empire for themselves. Their ships had already 
found the far-off continent of Australia as early as 1605. 
In America, in the opposite quarter of the world, an Eng- 
lisman named Henry Hudson, in Dutch employ, touched 
at Cape Cod in 1609. From there he sailed on to the 
coast of Virginia and then north to the present Hudson 
River, named now in his honor but discovered by 
Verrazano in 1524. Informed by Captain John Smith 
that the Northwest Passage was somewhere north of 


34 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


Virginia, Hudson kept a sharp outlook for this much 
coveted waterway. After finding the bay of New 
York, where the “ three great rivers ” of the Hudson, 
East River, and the channel between Staten Island and 
the mainland came together, he started northward on one 
of these. He sailed a short while and found the water 
of the river “ a mile broad; there is very high land on 



The Stadt Huys 

First City Hall in New York. Copyright, 1904, by Chas. Beseler 

Co., N. Y. 


both sides . . . very high and mountainous ” (the high¬ 
lands of the Hudson). He then came to “ other moun¬ 
tains which lie from the river’s side,” the Catskill Moun¬ 
tains, and probably turned back a little way above 
Albany. 












THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


35 


Other Dutch Explorers. — In 1614 Dutch traders 
erected their first rude huts on Manhattan Island, pur¬ 
chasing the land from the Indians for a few dollars’ 
worth of trinkets. In this same year Adrian Block 
explored the coast through Long Island Sound and 
reached as far east as Nahant in eastern Massachusetts, 
while another Dutch seaman, Cornelius May, sailed the 
waters of Delaware Bay. Cape May, at the mouth of 
the Delaware, received its name in honor of the latter 
explorer; Block Island, in Long Island Sound, from the 
former. 

New Netherland. — The new colony of the Dutch, 
called New Netherland, extended from eastern Massa¬ 
chusetts to the Delaware River, and had its main settle- 



Nieuw Amsterdam in 1650 
From an old Dutch map. 

ments on the present shores of New Jersey and New 
York on and near Manhattan Island. Its population 
remained very small for a long time, numbering after 
fifty years but two thousand inhabitants. New Amster¬ 
dam, on Manhattan Island, now New York City, con¬ 
tained for a long time only eight hundred souls. In 
1643 , when its inhabitants numbered only four hundred, 
eighteen different languages were spoken in its midst. 
From the beginning this center of the Dutch effort in 










36 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


America was a trading post, frequented by the men of 
many nations. 

Other Dutch Colonies. — New Holland, as the pres¬ 
ent continent of Australia was known for a long time, 



was visited by many Dutch explorers at this time. The 
greatest of these was Tasman, who sailed around the 
entire continent just before the middle of the sixteenth 















THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


37 


century. He discovered New Zealand, which he called 
Staten Island, and Tasmania, to which he gave the 
name Van Dieman’s Land. At about the same time, 
energetic Dutch seamen planted the flag of their country 
in the island of St. Eustatius and in certain other islands 
of the West Indies in North America, which the Spanish 
did not care for. 

World-wide Activities of the Dutch. — Southern New 
England in 1614, theoretically, at least, was in the hands 
of a nation of traders and explorers. These men were 
energetic enough to carry on the trade of the Spice 
Islands of Asia, and at the same time to explore such 
widely scattered parts of the world as southern New 
England and New York in North America, certain of 
the West India Islands on the north of South America, 
and the immense southern continent of New Holland 
or Australia. 

THE ENGLISH IN NEW ENGLAND 

Voyages of Exploration. — The explorations of the 
English along the coast of New England began as early 
as 1602, when Gosnold sojourned there briefly and named 
Cape Cod and Martin’s Vineyard (later corrupted into 
Martha’s Vineyard). Two other Englishmen, Pring 
and Weymouth, followed shortly. Then in 1614, the very 
year of the Dutch voyages of Block and May, came 
Captain John Smith, ex-president of the lately estab¬ 
lished colony of Virginia. Restless and adventurous, 
guided probably by Champlain’s maps, which were then 
published in Europe, Smith went over the coasts which 
Champlain, Hudson, and Block had touched before him. 
Starting from Monhegan Island, off the coast of Maine, 


38 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


where one party of his men made an enormous catch of 
fish, with another party he ranged the whole shore as 
far south as Cape Cod. He secured from the Indians 
thousands of beaver skins in exchange for mere trinkets, 



and made a good description and map of the country. 
The name New England was his suggestion. On his 
map for the first time appear the present geographical 
names of Plymouth, Cape Ann, Charles River, Boston, 
Cambridge, Cape Elizabeth, Ipswich, and Sandwich, 
though some of these now occupy sites different from 













THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


39 


those so named on Smith’s map. All these names were 
given by Smith in advance of settlement. The author 
caused thousands of copies of his account of the coun¬ 
try and of the map to be printed in England, in order to 
stir up interest in colonization. 

The Debatable Ground Occupied. — It thus appears 
that, when the English started in seriously to settle New 
England, they came into a land which was also claimed 
by the two other leading nations of Europe, the French 
and the Dutch. Spain, too, had never given up her 
claim. Trouble among the rival groups was inevitable. 
The English looked back to the Cabots for the justice of 
their claim, although in the long interval after 1498 
they had made no settlements in the country to make 
their claim good. The voyages of the Cabots would 
do them no good, if they could not succeed in effecting an 
actual settlement. There had been an unsuccessful. at¬ 
tempt by the Plymouth Company to plant a settlement 
at the mouth of the Kennebec River, at about the same 
time as that made by the London Company in Virginia. 
There were also scattered hamlets of English fishermen 
along the coast. The first permanent English settlers in 
New England were the Pilgrims who came to Plymouth, 
in eastern Massachusetts, in 1620. 

Why the Pilgrims came to America. — The Pilgrims 
or Separatists were formerly members of the Established 
Church of England, as the new Church was called in 
England after the overthrow of the Roman Catholic 
Church there. They were dissatisfied because they could 
not secure all the changes in the church which they 
wished. They desired therefore to separate from the or¬ 
ganization entirely and form a new church of their own. 
This, however, proved impossible in England; persecu- 


40 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


tions came; and rather than yield they fled to Holland, 
where in the city of Leyden they formed a church after 
their own belief. Here they lived for twelve years. 
Then new dissatisfaction arose, when the sturdy English 
emigrants saw their children forgetting their native 
tongue and learning the Dutch language and customs. 
Some were not prosperous in business in Holland, and 
desired to try their fortunes elsewhere; and some had 
the desire to carry the Gospel to the native peoples of 



The Brewster House, Scrooby, England 

The house of William Brewster was the first house of worship 
of the Scrooby church (organized in 1606), the members of which 
fled to Holland in 1608, and finally emigrated to New England 
in 1620. 

America. So they decided to become pilgrims again and 
seek new homes across the seas. 

The Settlement at Plymouth. — With the permission 
of the London Company, which had a grant of the terri¬ 
tory from the King of England, they planned to disregard 
the Dutch, who were already on the ground, and settle 





THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


41 


near the mouth of the Hudson River. The emigrants 
first went back home to England and embarked for 
America at Southampton in two vessels, the Speedwell 
and the Mayflower. But the Speedwell proved unsea¬ 
worthy, and the two vessels put in at Plymouth, where 
as many as could re-embarked on the Mayflower alone. 
Storms drove them out of their course, and they made 
land at Provincetown, on the northern shore of Cape 



The First Thanksgiving Dinner 

With portraits of the Pilgrim Fathers. From a drawing by W. L. 
Taylor. Copyright by The Ladies Home Journal. 


Cod, in November, 1620. Plymouth, the Plymouth of 
John Smith’s map, they reached on December 21. Here 
they remained despite terrible sufferings during the first 
winter from cold, hunger and disease, and set up a pure 
democracy in which the people ruled. Within twenty 
years they set up a representative law-making assembly 
after the model of the House of Burgesses of Virginia. 

Why the Puritans Came to Massachusetts Bay. —The 



42 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


Puritans were members of the Established Church of 
England, who were just as dissatisfied with the arrange¬ 
ments existing in the English Church as were the Pil¬ 
grims, but preferred to remain loyal to the organiza¬ 
tion, and to work for their desired reforms from the 
inside. Hence they did not follow the separatist pilgrims 
to Leyden and to Plymouth, to form a new church of 
their own. When at last they left England for America, 



The Barker House at Pembroke, Mass., 1628 

The first house built in America of which there is authentic 

record. 


it was politics as much as religion that drove them on. 
They were incensed because the arbitrary King Charles 
I opposed their measures in the national law-making 
body, called Parliament. The King even went so far 
as to dissolve that body and rule for eleven years with¬ 
out the aid of the people at all. From fifteen to twenty 
thousand Puritans came to eastern Massachusetts, in 
the single decade, 1630-1640, chiefly to .Salem, Boston, 





THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


43 


and the surrounding towns of Newtown (later Cam¬ 
bridge), Charlestown, Watertown, Roxbury and Dor¬ 
chester. Of these, Boston was from the first the most 
important. 



Statue of Roger Williams 

Rhode Island. — The founding of Rhode Island came 
in 1636, when Roger Williams, with a small band of 




44 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


followers, was banished from Massachusetts for too in¬ 
dependent views on religious questions and on matters 
of government. Though the Puritans had migrated to 
Massachusetts for political and religious liberty, their 
attitude toward those who differed from them and from 
the Puritan Church which they had established for them¬ 
selves, shows that they were very intolerant. The free¬ 
dom which they demanded for themselves they refused 



Rhode Island Colony 


to grant to others. The first settlement in Rhode Island 
was piously called Providence. “ The doctrine of perse¬ 
cution for the cause of conscience,” Williams wrote, “ is 
most evidently and lamentably contrary to the doctrine 
of Jesus Christ.” 

Connecticut. — Other “ uneasy ” people of Massa¬ 
chusetts, led by Thomas Hooker of Newtown and his 
entire congregation, established the beginnings of Con¬ 
necticut in the same vear, 1636, by settling Hartford on 
the Connecticut River. They made the difficult trip over- 

































THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 45 

land, dm ing their cattle before them and carrying their 
household goods in wagons. Unlike the Rhode Island 
settlers, Hooker and his followers struck into the wilder¬ 
ness of their own accord, solely because they were 
dissatisfied with things in Boston. 

New Haven. Fhe colony of New Haven was 
founded in 1638 by John Davenport and Theophilus 
Eaton, who had recently landed in Boston but had dis- 



CoNNECTICUT COLONY 

liked the spirit of intolerance and controversy in that 
town. New Haven and the surrounding towns were soon 
united to Connecticut. 

New Hampshire. — Early New Hampshire was also 
settled from Massachusetts, largely by those who were 
banished in 1636 and later. Leading settlements started 
at Exeter and Dover. After a short existence as an in¬ 
dependent colony, these settlements were joined to 
Massachusetts. 

Maine. — The colony of Maine was chartered in 1639, 
to extend from the Piscataqua to the Kennebec and for 
one hundred miles inland. There were small settlements 



























46 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


at Pemaquid, at the mouth of the Kennebec River, at 
Saco, and on the neck of land where Portland now stands. 
After a separate existence for about forty years Maine 
became a part of Massachusetts, and remained such till 
the nineteenth century. 

The Government of the New England Colonies. — The 

New England colonies were democracies, like Virginia. 
The right to vote was in general very limited and for a 
long time was enjoyed almost exclusively by members 
of the Puritan Church. As long as Roger Williams 
lived, Rhode Island had religious freedom, but after his 
death Roman Catholics were excluded from the colony. 
The law-making body was in each colony repre¬ 
sentative. 

The Town Meeting. — Throughout New England lo¬ 
cal government was in the hands of the town meeting, 
which was an annual mass meeting of the voters of the 
town. In this meeting every voter had the right to 
speak and take part in the election of the selectmen, 
town clerk, treasurer, constable, etc., and in the passing 
of town ordinances. This was an excellent training in 
self-government. 

The New England Confederation. — Soon after the 
founding of Massachusetts the four New England colo¬ 
nies of Massachusetts (including New Hampshire), Ply¬ 
mouth, Connecticut, and New Haven came together in 
a confederation or league for defense against their 
enemies. There were hostile Indians in their very midst, 
on the north the jealous French, and on the west the 
equally jealous Dutch. Rhode Island and Maine were 
excluded because powerful Massachusetts was jealous of 
both. The union government had charge of waging wars 
and of raising men and supplies for that purpose, and 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


47 



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The Western Hemisphere 

By Henry Hondius, 1630. From the Hondius-Mercator Atlas 
of 1633. One third original size. 





















48 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


made recommendations to the colonies on various other 
matters that were of interest to all. 

Education in New England. — One of the first com¬ 
munities in the world to enjoy popular education, was the 
English colonies in New England. In Massachusetts, 
every town of fifty householders or more was required 
to appoint one or more to teach “ all such children as 
shall report to him to read and write.” In every town of 
one hundred families there was a grammar school to fit 
youths for the University. This University was Harvard 
College, founded in Cambridge in 1636; Yale College, 
located first at Saybrook and then at New Haven, Con¬ 
necticut, was founded in 1701. The neighbors of Massa¬ 
chusetts followed her system of public schools, which 
was based on the desire that every person should be able 
to read the Bible. Out of this pious and laudable 
standard has sprung the present public school system 
of every state in the United States. 

Indian Wars. The Pequot War. — As the settlers 
occupied lands over which the Indians had formerly 
roamed freely and thus considered their own, troubles 
were bound to come. The first Indian war in New 
England was waged against the Pequots in 1637.. 
It resulted in the slaughter of over six hundred Indians 
near Stonington, in eastern Connecticut. The enemy 
were surprised in a stockade, and only seven lived to 
make their escape. 

King Philip’s War. — Forty years later all New 
England was involved in a larger Indian war, the dis¬ 
asters of which to the English a colonial writer summed 
up as follows: “ A true and brief account of our losses 
sustained since this cruel and mischievous war began, 
take as follows: In Narragansett not one house left 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


49 


standing. At Warwick, but one. Providence, not above 
three. At Potuxit none left. Very few at Seaconicke. 
At Swansey, two, at most. Marlboro, wholly laid in 
ashes, except two or three houses. Grantham and Nasha- 
way {i.e. Groton and Lancaster), all ruined but one 
house or two. Many houses burnt at Springfield, Scitu- 
ate, Lancaster, Brookfield, and Northampton. The 
greatest part of Rehoboth and Taunton destroyed. 
Great spoil made at Hadley, Hatfield, and Chelmsford. 
Deerfield wholly and Westfield much ruined. At Sudley 
many houses burnt, and some at Hingham, Weymouth, 
and Braintree. Besides particular farms and plantations, 
a great number not to be reckoned up, wholly laid waste, 
or very much damnified. And as to persons, it is gener¬ 
ally thought that of the English there hath been lost, 
in all, men, women, and children, above eight hundred 
since the war began.” 

Besides eight hundred lives, the English lost almost 
one million dollars’ worth of property. The Indians lost 
three thousand persons. King Philip, betrayed by one of 
his own men, was shot down by the settlers. His head 
and hands were cut off, and his body quartered and hung 
up on four trees. The power of the Indians in New 
England was broken forever. 


OTHER ENGLISH SETTLEMENTS AND VOYAGES 

The West Indies. — The rivalry between the English, 
French, and Dutch was even more intense in the West 
Indies than in New England. It is said that the Eng¬ 
lish and the French arrived at the island of St. Christo¬ 
pher’s on the same day. This was three years after the 


50 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


Pilgrims came to Plymouth in New England. From here 
the English spread to several of the surrounding islands, 
including Barbados and Antigua, while the French took 
Guadaloupe, Martinique, and others. The island of 
St. Eustatius and a few others fell to the Dutch. Be¬ 
cause of the great fertility of the islands, forward-look¬ 
ing business men in England for more than a century 
looked upon these settlements as their country’s most 
valuable colonial possessions. The thousands of people, 
who went to the mainland of America, came generally 
from the dissatisfied classes of England; they were little 
missed, and their continental settlements for a long time 
attracted little attention. 

The Northwest Passage. — During the wonderful era 
of colony-building, 1600-1640, the English ventured into 
one quarter of the globe where they were not followed 
by either the French or the Dutch. That was into the 
waters of Hudson Bay and the surrounding waters, north 
of North America. Frobisher and others had already 
pointed the way hither, searching for the Northwest 
Passage. Henry Hudson, now in English employ, pene¬ 
trated Hudson Strait and in 1610 discovered the bay 
later named for him. Here he perished, set adrift in an 
open boat by his own mutinous crew. No one in Eng¬ 
land really knew whether or not he had discovered the 
Northwest Passage. To find out whether he had, four 
large English expeditions and one Danish expedition 
cruised in these waters between 1612 and 1630. The men 
of these parties suffered untold hardships, some of them 
even passing the winter in the arctic regions. William 
Baffin led an expedition to the present Baffin Bay at 77° 
45' North Latitude, which remained “ farthest North ” 
in these regions for 236 years. Baffin went three hundred 




























































THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


51 


miles farther toward the pole than Davis in his voyage 
a half century earlier. 

England’s Interest in Colonies. — As a whole, the 
English people were least interested in the expeditions 
to the mainland of North America. They were more in¬ 
terested in those to the West Indies; and they were 
supremely interested in the work of Hudson, Baffin, and 
their followers, which might give to their country at any 
time a new route to China and the Spice Islands. 
Eastern Asia and the nearby islands were still the great 
commercial goal of the world, and were to remain so for 
a long time. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. Why did England seek to discover the Northwest 
Passage and the Northeast Passage? Why were these voyages 
so,difficult? What Englishmen set out for North America 
before the settlement of Virginia? Why did Spain send her 
fleet against England? What effects did the defeat of the 
Spaniards have in the settlement of North America? 

2. Why is John Smith important in the history of Vir¬ 
ginia? When Smith was in Virginia, what did he believe con¬ 
cerning the geography of the rest of North America? Why 
was he so ignorant? Name two important events in Virginia 
in the year 1619? How did Spain look upon Virginia? 

3. What three rival nations sought to get possession of 
New England? What explorers did each of the three rivals 
send to the coast of New England just after 1600? Which one 
of these seems to you to have been the most interesting? 
Why? Give a description of the Dutch as colony builders. 
In what respects were they great as seamen and as traders? 

4. What Englishman, prominent in the history of Virginia, 
also played a part in the history of New England? He may be 
compared with what great French explorer? In what re¬ 
spects? Why did the Pilgrims leave England? Where was 
their home? Explain how they happened to land at Plymouth. 
How did the Puritans differ from the Pilgrims? Describe how 


52 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 


the Puritans scattered over New England. What efforts did 
the Puritans make to defend themselves against the Indians? 
Describe education in early New England? 

5. When did the English begin to go to the West Indies? 
Why did they go there? What voyages did the English make 
to find the Northwest Passage, i600-1640? What do you 
remember about William Baffin? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the settlers of New England were unjust 
in their treatment of the Indians. 

2. Resolved, That Champlain did more for North America 
than John Smith. 


Topics for Composition 

1. Describe the things in which an adventurous and travel- 
loving English sailor might take interest, between 1575 and 
1625, as he considered contemporary affairs in various parts 
of the world. 

2. The feats accomplished by Champlain in America. 

3. What the Puritans knew and what they did not know in 
1630 about the geography of North America. 

4. The first landing in Plymouth and in Boston. Hart, 
Colonial Children, 133 and 136. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Manners and customs of the Puritans. Fisher, Men, 
Women, and Manners in Colonial Times; Earle, Customs and 
Fashions in Old New England. 

2. The search for the Northwest Passage. Laut, The 
Conquest of the Great Northwest. 

3. The First Thanksgiving. Norton, Magazine of Ameri¬ 
can History , December, 1885; Love, The Fast and Thanks¬ 
giving Days of New England. 

Important Dates 

1588. Defeat of Spanish Armada. 

1607. Settlement of Virginia. (Jamestown) 


THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS 53 

1614. Settlement of New Netherland. (New Amsterdam) 
1620. Settlement of Plymouth. 

1630. Settlement of Massachusetts. (Boston) 


Books to Remember 


- 1. John Fiske, Beginnings of New England, and Old Vir¬ 
ginia and her Neighbors. 


CHAPTER III 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 
OUTSIDE NEW ENGLAND 

SPREAD OF THE ENGLISH ALONG THE COAST 

Introduction. — In the first rush of the English and 
French for the vacant lands of North America in the 
early part of the seventeenth century, the English seem 
to have chosen the better part, namely, the Atlantic 
coast from New England to Virginia. The French occu¬ 
pied the colder regions of Nova Scotia and the valley 
of the St. Lawrence. England stuck to the coast, main¬ 
taining and improving its advantage in the middle and 
last part of the century. France, on the other hand, 
pushed on into the interior through the valley of the 
St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes. 

Maryland. — Fourteen years after the Pilgrim 
Fathers came to Plymouth, while Massachusetts was fill¬ 
ing up with Puritans, and before Rhode Island and Con¬ 
necticut were founded, three hundred Englishmen, many 
of them Roman Catholics, under the leadership of Lord 
Baltimore, planted a colony to the north of Virginia. 
It was called Maryland in honor of Henrietta Maria, 
the Queen of King Charles I. In Virginia and New 
England there were practically no Roman Catholics. In 
England, on the other hand, these were many, but the 
laws were very strict against them, so that the new 

54 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


55 



Ontario• 


S-1 

3 1 629 n 

Jjlyrno uth, 1620 


yNew Amsterdam 
) 1623 

Sweden, 

1638 


istown 


fr ^ nc i lic Islimd 


ugustine, 
1 565 N 


refuge was sorely needed. As Maryland tolerated all 
who professed “ to believe in Jesus Christ/’ there were 
Protestants as well as Roman Catholics in the colony. 


ATLANTIC SETTLEMENTS 

SCALE OF MILES 


0 100 200 300 400 500 

NOTE.—A line drawn through a 
name indicates that the attempted 
settlement teas a failure. 


Atlantic Settlements 


Dutch New Netherland Conquered. — The Dutch, who 
had settled down in the valley of the Hudson, about 
Manhattan Island, achieved one success against the ri¬ 
vals who surrounded them. This was in 1655, when they 
conquered the few small Swedish settlements on the Del- 


































56 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


aware, including one on the present site of Philadelphia. 
Nine years later an English fleet suddenly swooped 
down on New Netherland, and annexed them all, Dutch 
and Swedes alike, to England. There was no resistance. 
This occupation of the valley of the Hudson gave the 
English a new way of approach against the French in 
Canada, and thus greatly strengthened their position on 
the coast. New Netherland now became New York, 
under the King’s brother, the Duke of York, as pro¬ 
prietor. 

New Jersey. — The Duke of York created the colony 
of New Jersey by granting the coast east of the Dela¬ 
ware to two of his friends. English Quakers became 
interested in this colony, and sent over to it numerous 
settlers. 

The Carolinas. — Eight courtiers of the King became 
the joint proprietors of the new trading colony of Caro¬ 
lina, on the south of Virginia, dangerously near the 
Spaniards in Florida. Recruits came from New England, 
and from Barbados in the West Indies. A settlement 
was founded in 1670 on the Ashley and Cooper Rivers, 
which, despite some failures, slowly developed into the 
town of Charleston. Scotch Highlanders, and persecuted 
French Protestants, known as Huguenots, also came to 
the colony. The division of the colony into North Car¬ 
olina and South Carolina was made in the first part of 
the eighteenth century. 

Pennsylvania. — England further fortified her power 
in the land which she acquired from the Dutch, by 
allowing William Penn and the new English sect of 
Quakers to settle west of the Delaware River. The 
King owed Penn’s father a large sum of money. After 
the latter’s death he chose to pay the debt to the son by 



200 


300 















































ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 57 

the grant of 40,000 acres of wilderness lands. Phila¬ 
delphia, the City of Brotherly Love, was founded by 
Penn in 1683, on the site of a former Swedish settlement. 
Penn dedicated the province to religious liberty, and 
welcomed men of all sects. Pennsylvania was known as 
a poor man’s paradise, and became celebrated as a refuge 


William Penn 

for the oppressed of every land. Penn was remarkably 
successful in his dealings with the Indians. No part of 
the mainland enjoyed a more rapid growth, and Phila¬ 
delphia quickly outstripped every other American town 
in population. 





58 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


The Quakers. — The new sect of Quakers, founded in 
England by George Fox soon after 1640, did not believe 
in an organized church, in bishops, and ministers, and 
sermons, but in the “ inner light,” which shone in the 
hearts of all men alike and rendered ordinary church 
services superfluous. Quakers did not take off their hat 
to persons in authority, because they believed that all 
men were equal. They opposed war and all taxes in its 
support. The new religion took a strong hold on its 
followers, who became noted for the simplicity and 
sweetness of their faith and for their courage in the 
midst of persecutions. 

Persecutions of the Quakers in New England. — An 

old book, A Declaration oj the Sad and Great Persecu¬ 
tion and Martyrdom of the . . . Quakers in New Eng¬ 
land, declares that Quakers in New England were 
“ whipped,” “ beaten with pitched ropes,” u banished,” 
“ kept in jail without food,” “ laid neck and heels 
in irons,” “burnt with the letter H (for heretic),” 
“ cut ” in their right ears, sold into slavery “ to Bar¬ 
bados, Virginia, or any of the English plantations,” 
while “ three of the servants of the Lord were put to 
death.” 

This attitude toward the Quakers in their midst, their 
intolerance toward Roger Williams and other dissenters, 
and their harsh treatment of the Indians and of the sup¬ 
posed witches, show the Puritan settlers of New England 
to have been as cruel as they were conscientious. 

Delaware. — The royal proprietor of New York 
granted to Penn, the proprietor of Pennsylvania, the 
three lower counties on the Delaware River, that Penn¬ 
sylvania might have an outlet of its own to the sea. 
Penn granted the Delaware region a legislature of its 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 59 

own, as he did Pennsylvania, though he retained his 
rights of proprietor in both. 

Georgia. — Georgia was settled in 1753 under the 
auspices of an English philanthropist, James Oglethorpe, 
and a board of “trustees.” The poverty-stricken of the 
British Islands and of certain parts of Germany flocked 
to the new colony in great numbers. The first settle¬ 
ment was at Savannah. 

The Dominion of New England. — The acquisition of 
New York, New Jersey, and Delaware from the Dutch, 
and the foundation of Carolina and Pennsylvania, created 
a continuous coastline of colonies for the English all 
the way from Maine to the Carolinas. Opportunity had 
come for attempting an ambitious plan, which, if suc¬ 
cessful, would greatly strengthen the position of the 
English against that of their French rivals. This was 
nothing less than the union of all their colonies into one 
grand whole. Accordingly, the New England colonies, 
New York, and New Jersey w r ere joined under the title 
of the Dominion of New England, with Edmund Andros 
as the first governor. The latter took office in 1686. 
The plan went no further, though it was the intention to 
include all the remaining colonies, and thus to wipe out 
the boundaries of the separate colonies entirely. In two 
years time, as a result of his tyrannical and arbitrary 
government, the King of England was driven from his 
throne, and the Dominion of New England, which was 
his own creation, fell to pieces. The colonies resumed 
their former separate existence. As such they stood 
ready to face the French, who were devoting themselves 
to building up their power on the north and west and 
beyond the Appalachians. 


60 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


THE EXPANSION OF THE FRENCH INTO THE 

INTERIOR 

Introduction. — Perhaps the French coveted the Atlan¬ 
tic coast but refrained from serious attempts to settle 
down there, out of fear of the English, who got there 
before them. Perhaps the French preferred the interior 
and were quite willing to leave the English on the edge 
of the continent. For some reason or other, after Cham¬ 
plain had founded New France, his followers devoted 
themselves for the remainder of the seventeenth century 
to the wilderness in the rear of their rivals. 

The Great Lakes. — The great Champlain, discoverer 
of Lakes Ontario, Huron, and Oneida, did not penetrate 
to the west farther than Lake Huron. Jean Nicolet 
threaded his way into Lake Michigan in 1634, equipped, 
says the original account, with a richly embroidered ori¬ 
ental robe, that he might enter the court of the Emperor 
of China, properly attired. In 1641 Fathers Raymbaut 
and Isaac Jogues were at the “ Sault Ste. Marie,” where 
they heard rumors of “ another great lake that com¬ 
mences above the Sault.” This was soon to be known as 
Lake Superior, or Upper Lake, that is, the lake last 
reached by one ascending the Great Lake system. All 
Champlain’s successors as they journeyed to the west 
habitually followed in the way of their leader, up the 
Ottawa River to Lake Huron, and from there on to 
Lakes Michigan and Superior. Lake Erie, which lay 
out of this path, did not fall under the observation of 
the French till later, probably about 1670. 

The Jesuit Relation of 1670-1671. — The Jesuits, 
as the members of the Roman Catholic missionary So¬ 
ciety of Jesus were called, were usually in the vanguard 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


61 


of this forward movement of the French. Their Re¬ 
lations, or the accounts of their wanderings by these 
Jesuits, unfold a stirring narrative. 

The French Take Possession of the Lake Superior 
Country. — Particularly dramatic is the picture pre¬ 
sented in this narrative of the seizure of the southern 
shores of Lake Superior by the French. Monsieur de 
Saint Lusson, the King's representative, stood before 
the assembled ambassadors of fourteen surrounding 
tribes of savages. Before the gaping and wondering bar¬ 
barian gaze, first the cross was blessed with all the 
solemn rites of the Roman church and raised aloft. 
All the Frenchmen joined in the singing of the old Latin 
hymn Vexilla. The standard of France was next fixed 
to a pole, and raised above the cross, with the singing 
of the hymn Exaudiat. Prayer was then offered for His 
Majesty's person, there in the virgin forests of the in¬ 
terior of America, thousands of miles from France. 
Monsieur de Saint Lusson, observing all due forms and 
ceremonies, then formally took possession of the region 
for France, while the air resounded with repeated shouts 
of “ Long live the King " and with the sound of mus¬ 
ketry, all “ to the delight and astonishment of those 
peoples, who had never seen anything of the kind," 
quaintly adds the Jesuit narrative. In impressive lan¬ 
guage Monsieur de Saint Lusson explained that he had 
summoned the savages to receive them under the pro¬ 
tection of the King of France. “ The whole ceremony 
was closed with a fine bonfire which was lighted toward 
the evening, and around which the Te Deum was sung 
to thank God, on behalf of those poor peoples, that 
they were now the subjects of so great and powerful 
a monarch." 


62 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


The Country around Lake Superior. — There were 
five Jesuit missions surrounding Lake Superior in these 
early times. Southward was “ the great river which 
they call the Mississippi,” believed by the natives to 
be larger than the St. Lawrence. This was a hint of 
the present Mississippi, three years before it was actu¬ 
ally reached by the French in 1673. The Relations con¬ 
tain numerous early references to the great interior river. 
The prairie country the Jesuits referred to in the fol¬ 
lowing language, “ the prairie country, extending to our 
knowledge more than three hundred leagues in every 
direction, to say nothing of its further extent of which 
we have no knowledge, affords ample sustenance to the 
wild cows, not infrequently encountered in herds of four 
or five hundred each.” Frequent mention is made in 
the early accounts of the copper mines on the southern 
shores of Lake Superior, “ slabs and huge lumps . . . 
each weighing a hundred or two hundred livres and 
much more,” “ that great rock of copper, seven or eight 
hundred livres in weight, seen near the head of the lake 
by all who pass.” In the west, fifty leagues away, were 
the “ Nadouessi,” the modern Sioux, who used only bow 
and arrow in their fighting, and were “ very populous 
and warlike . . . the Iroquois of these regions, waging 
war, almost unaided, with all the tribes hereabout.” 

Joliet and Marquette. — Accompanied by Father 
Marquette and five other companions, Louis Joliet in 
the year 1673 set out from the Straits of Mackinaw at 
the head of Lake Michigan, on the old search for the 
Northwest Passage to China. They passed over Lake 
Michigan, easily ascended the Fox River, and by a 
short portage came to the Wisconsin, down which they 
paddled to “ the great river which they call the Mis- 



















































ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


63 


sissippi.” The hope of the travelers was that this water¬ 
way would carry them to “ a passage from here to the 
sea of China, by the river that discharges itself into the 
Vermillion or California Sea.” 

When the party came to the Arkansas River, they 
turned back out of fear of the Spaniards. In the words 
of Marquette, “ after attentively considering that we 
were not far from the Gulf of Mexico, ... we judged 
that we could not be more than two or three days’ 
journey from it; and that, beyond a doubt, the Missis¬ 
sippi discharges itself into the Florida or Mexican Gulf, 
and not to the east in Virginia, ... or to the west in 
California, because in that case our route would have 
been to the west or to the west southwest, whereas we 
had always continued it toward the south.” 

Marquette records that after they were forced to give 
up the hope that the Mississippi would lead them to 
China, they still entertained the belief that the “ Muddy 
River,” the Missouri, would lead them there. Marquette 
himself hoped that he might some day accomplish this 
journey to the Orient. 

Joliet’s Description of the Country. — Joliet wrote on 
a great map which he drew of his explorations: “ I have 
seen nothing in France so beautiful as the abundance 
of fine prairies and nothing so pleasant as the varieties 
of groves and forests, where one can pick plums, pome¬ 
granates, lemons, and several small fruits which are not 
found in Europe. In the fields quail arise; in the woods 
parrots are seen; and in the rivers one catches fish which 
cannot be identified by taste, shape, or size. Iron mines 
and reddish rocks, never found except with copper, are 
not rare; likewise slate, saltpetre, coal, marble, and 
alloys of copper. The largest pieces of copper that I 


64 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


saw were as large as a fist and free from impurities. 
It was discovered near the reddish rocks, which were 
much like those of France and numerous. All the sav¬ 
ages have canoes, fifty feet and more in length; they 
do not care for deer as food, but they kill buffalo, which 
roam in herds of thirty or fifty. I have myself counted 
four hundred on the banks of the river; and turkevs are 
extremely common. They harvest Indian corn gen¬ 
erally three times a year, and they have water melons 
for refreshment in the heat, since there is no ice and 
very little snow. One of the great rivers running into 
the Mississippi from the west gives a passage into the 
Gulf of California. . . . The description of everything 
could have been seen in my diary, if the good fortune 
which attended me through the journey had not failed 
me a quarter of an hour before arriving at the place 
from which I had departed. I had escaped the dangers 
from the savages, I had passed forty rapids, and was 
about to land with all possible joy over the success of 
such a long and difficult undertaking, when my canoe 
was overturned and I lost two men and my chest, in 
the sight and at the doors of the first French houses 
that I had left nearly two years before.” 

La Salle. — In 1682 La Salle passed over Joliet’s route 
from the Great Lakes to the Arkansas River, and be¬ 
yond to the very mouth of the Mississippi. Here, in 
another elaborate ceremony, similar to that on the shores 
of Lake Superior, he took possession of the country for 
the King of France and gave it the name of Louisiana. 
He then went back to Canada and to France; and in 
1685, on an overseas expedition direct from France, he 
landed on the coast of Texas and founded an ill-fated 
fort. His followers lived on here for two years. He 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


65 


failed in his endeavor to find the mouth of the Missis¬ 
sippi from the Gulf of Mexico, and was killed by one 
of his own men. 


THE HUDSON BAY COUNTRY 

The English on Hudson Bay. — Looking to the future 
building up of a “ far-flung ” colonial empire along the 
great interior water systems of the St. Lawrence and the 
Mississippi, the French certainly could take great satis¬ 
faction in the fact that they had in their possession all 
the lands “ on the back ” of the English on the seaboard. 
Soon a disturbing factor confronted the French, when 
the English in turn established themselves “ on the 
back ” of the French by forming the Hudson Bay Com¬ 
pany in 1670 to compete with the French for the trade 
with the Indians surrounding Hudson Bay. This Eng¬ 
lish fur-trading company took away from the French 
millions of dollars’ worth of Indian trade and proved a 
considerable handicap to the French plans of develop¬ 
ment. A few English trading posts appeared on Hudson 
Bay but never any growing settlements. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. For what was Maryland early famous? Why did the 
English conquer the Dutch in New Netherland? For what 
was Pennsylvania noted? In what respects was colonial 
Pennsylvania more advanced than New England? Why did 
the Dominion of New England fail? 

2. In what order were the Great Lakes discovered? Why 
did Lake Erie come last? Why was there so much pomp and 
ceremony when the French took possession of a region? Why 
did Joliet and Marquette think that they might reach China 
on their trip down the Mississippi? Who was the greatest 


66 


ENGLISH AND FRENCH RIVALRY 


of the French, explorers? Which one found out the most 
important and the most interesting facts of geography? 

3. Why did the English establish settlements on Hudson 
Bay? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That it would have been a good thing for 
England if she had succeeded in establishing the Dominion 
of New England. 

2. Resolved, That the early missionaries were a failure 
in civilizing the Indians. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Picture yourself accompanying one of the early French 
explorers in the interior of America, say Joliet, and describe 
your experiences. — McMurray, Pioneers on Land and Sea. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The French in the region of Lake Superior. Thwaites, 
Jesuit Relations, LV, 95-225. 


Important Dates 

1664. Conquest of New Netherland by the English. 

1673. Joliet and Marquette on the Mississippi. 

1682. La Salle on the Mississippi. 

1683. Founding of Pennsylvania. (Philadelphia.) 

Books to Remember 

1. Francis Parkman, La Salle and the Great West, and 
Pioneers of France in the New World. 


CHAPTER IV 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 

NATIVE PLANTS 

Introduction. — It is not difficult to form a fairly 
complete picture of what the first Europeans saw and 
did in America, what were their experiences in the new 
land, and how they made their living. In the virgin 
fields, and forests, and waters, the newcomers found the 
struggle for existence comparatively easy, getting a 
food supply never a serious problem. 

Indian Corn. — Indian corn, or maize (an Indian 
word) was cultivated everywhere by the Indians, when 
the first Europeans arrived on the continent. ‘Columbus 
found it in the West Indies. Of his brother in 1498 he 
wrote, “ During a journey in the interior he found a 
dense population, entirely agricultural, and at one place 
passed through eighteen miles of corn fields.” De Soto 
saw many villages surrounded by corn fields. La Salle 
found corn in Illinois. “ On the 14th of July,” says 
another Frenchman, one of La Salle’s contemporaries, 
“ we remained at the four villages of the Senecas ten 
days. All the time we spent in destroying the corn, 
which including the old corn that was in cache, which 
we burned, was in such great abundance that the ears 
were computed at 400,000 minots or 1,200,000 bushels.” 

67 


68 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


Native Cultivation of Corn. — Lescarbot, a compan¬ 
ion of Champlain, writing in 1609, described as follows 
the Indian method of cultivating corn in French Canada; 

“ All these people till their land with a wooden pick-axe, 
weed out the weeds and burn them, manure their fields 
with shell-fish, having neither tame cattle nor dung; 
then they heap up their ground in small heaps, each 
two feet apart from the other; and when the month of 
May comes they plant their corn in these heaps of earth, 
as we plant beans, setting up a stick, and putting into 
the hole four grains of corn separate one from the other, 
in accordance with a superstition of theirs; and between 
the plants of the said corn, which grows like a small 
tree, and ripens at the end of three months, they also 
set beans spotted with all colors, which are very deli¬ 
cate, and not being so high, grow very well among these 
stalks of corn. . . . When this corn reaches its full 
height, as we have said, its stalk is as big as a cane, 
or rather bigger. The stalk and corn, cut when green, 
have a sugary taste, which is the reason why the moles 
and field rats covet it so; for they spoiled me a plot of 
it in New France. Large animals, too, such as stags 
and other wild beasts, and birds also, make havoc of it; 
and the Indians are constrained to set watch over them, 
as we do over vines here. 

“ The harvest over, this people lay up their corn in 
the ground in pits, which they make on some slope of a 
hill, or mound, to drain off the water, fitting up the 
pits with mats; or place their corn in bags made of 
grass, which they afterwards cover with sand, and this 
they do because they have no houses with lofts, nor 
chests to lay it up otherwise; besides, corn kept after 
this manner, is out of the way of rats and mice.” 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


69 


This native corn was the leading gift of the Indians to 
the whites, and is now America’s “ most important and 
distinctive crop.” From time to time the product has 
been greatly improved. 

Tobacco. — Tobacco, the most widely used narcotic 
in the world, was a native plant in universal use by the 
Indians. Columbus on his first voyage found the natives 
smoking tobacco in Cuba in 1492, and reported that 
he had seen people whose habit it was to carry lighted 
fire brands to kindle fire. He found snuff-taking on 
his second voyage, and others found tobacco-chewing in 
South America in 1502. The Spaniards early introduced 
tobacco into Europe. Tobacco-smoking was introduced 
into England by Sir Walter Raleigh at the end of the six¬ 
teenth and at the beginning of the seventeenth century. 
Its use spread very rapidly throughout the world. The 
prosperity of Virginia, which was then receiving its first 
settlers, was assured, when it was found that the land 
was peculiarly fitted for raising the plant essential to the 
new fad of smoking. 

The Tobacco Habit among the Natives. — Lescarbot, 
in the book already quoted, thus describes the tobacco 
habit among the Indians: “After they have, gathered 
this herb, they dry it in the shade, and have certain 
small leather bags, hanging about their necks, or at 
their girdles, wherein they always have some, with a 
calumet or tobacco pipe, which is a little horn with a 
hole at one side, and within the hole they fit a long quill 
or pipe, out of which they suck the smoke of the tobacco, 
which is within the said horn, after lighting it with a 
coal which they lay upon it. They will sometimes en¬ 
dure hunger five or six days with the aid of that smoke. 
And our Frenchmen, who have frequented them, are 


70 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


for the most part so bewitched with this drunkenness of 
tobacco, that they can no more be without it than 
without meat or drink, and upon it they spend good 
money.” 

Sugar. — It has been disputed whether or not the 
Europeans found sugar cane in America. If they did. 
the native product was of a poor quality and restricted 
to narrow areas, probably in South America. The Span¬ 
iards introduced Asiatic sugar cane into America in the 
sixteenth century, that they might assure themselves of 
an increased supply of sugar in Spain to sweeten the 
new and very popular drinks that were then being in¬ 
troduced. These were from America, chocolate and 
cocoa, from the native American cacao plant. The 
demand for sugar increased in the next century with 
the drinking of coffee, which started in England with the 
introduction there of the Arabian coffee bean from the 
East Indies by Dutch merchants in 1690. The Eu¬ 
ropeans soon came to be very fond of assembling in 
public drinking houses, which they called cafes, from 
the French word for coffee. The drinking of the new 
Asiatic tea started in Europe in the same century. 
It is no wonder that there was a strong demand for 
sugar in Europe in colonial times to satisfy the lovers 
of chocolate, cocoa, coffee, and tea. The Mother 
Country of England fought many a battle for the pos¬ 
session of the various “ sugar islands ” in the West 
Indies. These small islands were every whit as valu¬ 
able as the Portuguese and Dutch “ Spice Islands ” of 
the East. 

The cultivation of the sugar plant was introduced on 
the mainland of the United States in the middle of the 
eighteenth century, but was not an important product 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 71 

there till 1820. Louisiana was then and is now the chief 
sugar state. 

Cotton. — The very ancient cotton plant, known to 
the early Hindus of India and to the early Egyptians 
thousands of years before the birth of Christ, was found 
by Cortez in use among the Mexican Indians in 1519. 
Other explorers discovered it among the natives of Peru, 



King Cotton 

but it was probably not in use by the Indians in any 
part of the United States. Not till the last of the eight¬ 
eenth century did the “ vegetable wool ” play any part in 
the history of America. It then came to the front under 
circumstances that cannot be wholly understood till 
later on in this history. The change was brought about 
by the invention of the cotton gin, and was closely con- 


72 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


nected with the development of the institution of negro 
slavery. Little cotton was raised in America during the 
colonial period. There are today three varieties of cotton 
grown in the United States. First, the native American 
cotton, known as “ sea island ” cotton, which has a long 
fiber and grows in the islands off the coast of South Caro¬ 
lina, Georgia, and Florida, but only to a slight extent on 
the mainland. Second, the “ upland ” variety, which is 
an importation. This has a short and coarse fiber and is 
the universal crop of the “ Cotton Belt ” of the South¬ 
ern States. Third, a long staple variety, recently intro¬ 
duced from Egypt and now growing in the deserts of 
Arizona, where the Roosevelt dam and other irrigation 
projects have brought in an abundance of water. 

Rice. — A food-bearing grass was found in South 
Carolina and in other parts of America, which was des¬ 
tined to be a very important crop in all the southern 
English colonies. At first the native rice of the Indians 
was used. Then a better variety was introduced from 
Madagascar by chance in 1694, when a European vessel 
called at a port of Carolina and left a few samples of 
the better product. 

Other Native Products. — Another important native 
product was the potato, which was found under cul¬ 
tivation in Peru as early as 1542. It was introduced into 
Ireland by Sir Walter Raleigh just before 1600, and 
instantly became that island’s leading product. Indeed 
“ Irish ” potatoes, although natives of America, were 
not in common use in the English colonies till intro¬ 
duced into New England by immigrants from Ireland 
in 1718. Sweet potatoes were also native in America, as 
well as peanuts, which probably originated in Brazil, 
beans, pumpkins, squashes, sunflowers, watermelons, and 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


73 


muskmelons. Native dishes added to the world’s menu 
were mush and succotash. The words pumpkin, mush 
and succotash are of Indian origin. Cassava bread, a 
starchy food, obtained from the root of the cassava plant, 
a native of the West Indies and South America, yielded 
“ the greatest portion of the daily food of the natives 
of the tropics ” in the early days. It is still very im¬ 
portant. Tapioca is prepared from the cassava plant. 

IMPORTED PLANTS 

Wheat. — Perhaps the second most important crop 
of America todav is wheat, which was introduced from 
Europe. This may have once grown wild in the valley 
of the Tigris and the Euphrates in Asia. The cave 
dwellers in Switzerland cultivated it before the dawn of 
history; it was cultivated in China three thousand years 
before Christ, and was a leading crop in early Egypt 
and Palestine. The story is told that a negro slave of 
Cortez in Mexico found three or four grains of wheat 
in the rice that was being served to the Spanish army 
there, and that this, when planted, was the beginning 
of wheat in America. The English explorer, Gosnold, 
introduced it into the Elizabeth Islands off the coast 
of Massachusetts in 1602, and it was early planted in 
the successive English colonies. In modern times, wheat, 
like corn, has been greatly improved by selection and 
cultivation. Such a great authority as Luther Burbank 
of California has made the statement that whenever a 
single grain is added to each head of wheat by breeding, 
Nature produces annually 15,000,000 extra bushels of 
wheat in the United States of America alone. 

Other Field Crops. — The Europeans introduced oats 


74 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


into America at an early date. Barley, rye, buckwheat, 
flax, and hemp are other imported crops, alfalfa also and 
other kinds of hay, as well as various kinds of clover, 
although there were certain native grasses and clover. 

Garden Vegetables. — The Europeans could not rely 
on America for many garden vegetables, but were forced 
to bring from home the present peas, beets, lettuce, 
onions, radishes, turnips, cabbage, carrots, and 
cucumbers. 

NATIVE FRUITS 

Grapes. — On an interesting map of New England and 
Canada drawn by the Frenchman, Lescarbot, at the be- 



Native Grapes, Tobacco, and Corn 
From Lescarbot’s old map. 


ginning of the seventeenth century, grapes are pictured 
by the author along with tobacco and corn as the three 
leading plants of the region. 

Early America a Natural Vineyard. — An early 
settler wrote of New England in 1632: “Vines of this 




AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


/O 

kind of trees there are that bear grapes of three colors, 
that is to say, white, black and red. The country is 
so apt of vines, but for the fire at the spring of the year, 
the vines would so overspread the land, that one should 
not be able to pass for them; the fruit of some is as 
big as a musket bullet, and is excellent in taste.” Many 
attempts were made on the part of the colonists to 
cultivate these native grapes as well as to introduce the 
grapes of Europe. This had little success, so that Amer¬ 
ica had no cultivated vineyards and no grapes of quality 
throughout the colonial period. 

The Native American Grapes of Today. — There were 
no cultivated vineyards in the United States till the nine¬ 
teenth century. The first cultivated native grape was the 
Catawba, which was discovered growing wild and profuse 
in North Carolina in 1802. From that time this grape 
was gradually developed in the vineyards of John Adlum 
of Washington, in the District of Columbia, and by 
Nicholas Longworth of Cincinnati, and others. The 
second was the Concord grape, the production of which 
was the greatest event in the history of American vine¬ 
yards. In 1843 some boys in Concord, Massachusetts, 
found grapes growing wild on the banks of the neigh¬ 
boring Charles River. They brought them to Ephraim 
Wales Bull, who planted and tended them and from 
them developed a grape which he named the Concord. 
The third grape, the Delaware, was found in New Jersey 
the very next year. The fourth was the Niagara. These 
four great American grapes date from the nineteenth 
century. European grapes do • not thrive here. 

Apples. — Apples, too, were native, but those found 
at first were all crabs, and as John Smith said in early 
Virginia, were “ very small and bitter.” Modern vari- 


76 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


eties did not begin to make their appearance till the 
presidency of Washington. 

The first Baldwins were found growing wild by Samuel 
Thompson in 1793, while he was locating the line of the 
Middlesex Canal in eastern Massachusetts. The McIn¬ 
tosh Red, another native apple, was found in 1796 in 
Ontario, Canada. The Northern Spy was found about 



(a) 



(b) 

Nuts, Fruits, and Vegetables in Early America 
From Champlain’s Map of 1612. 


1800 in New York State. Many others have been dis¬ 
covered since, and all have been greatly improved by 
culture and careful breeding. 

Berries. — A native strawberry, somewhat different 
from the varieties known in Europe, grew T in almost all 
parts of early America. Said Roger Williams, in de- 












AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


77 


scribing early New England: “ This berry is the wonder 
of all the fruits growing naturally in those parts; it is of 
itself excellent, so that one of the chiefest doctors of 
England was wont to say that God could have made, 
but never did, a better berry. ... In some parts, where 
the natives have planted, I have seen so many as would 
fill a good ship, within a few miles compass. The Indi¬ 
ans bruise them in a mortar, and mix them with meal, 
and make strawberry bread.” This strawberry bread 
was a common Indian dish. The present cultivated 
strawberries, like the present grapes and apples, date 
only from the nineteenth century. 

Black and red raspberries, blackberries, and goose¬ 
berries were domesticated from natives in the second 
quarter of the nineteenth century. At the same period 
cranberries, which had been first domesticated from the 
native product on Cape Cod in 1810, began to attract 
general attention in New Jersey, Wisconsin, and other 
states. Currants, elderberries, and huckleberries are also 
natives. There were blueberries in Europe, resembling 
those found in America. 

Plums and Cherries. — The Europeans found many 
kinds of native plums in America, at least five of which 
have been domesticated. Choke cherries and black cher¬ 
ries were also common. An early New Englander 
quaintly describes the common choke cherry as follows: 
“ The cherry trees yield great store of cherries, which 
grow in clusters like grapes; they are much smaller 
than our English cherry, nothing near so good if they 
be not fully ripe; they so fur the mouth that the tongue 
will cleave to the roof, and the throat wax hoarse with 
swallowing those red bullies (as I may call them), being 
little better in taste. English ordering may bring them 


78 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


to an English cherry, but they are as wild as the 
Indians.” 

Tomatoes. — The native American tomatoes have had 
a strange career. For centuries they were held in dis¬ 
repute as poisonous and under the name of “ love 
apples ” were raised for ornamental purposes only. 
Though generally cultivated in the gardens of today, 
they did not come into use for food purposes till well 
into the nineteenth century. 

Bananas. — Bananas have been used as food in the 
United States for only about fifty years. The conti¬ 
nental English colonies did not know them; and as late 
as 1865 few people in the United States had ever seen 
them. Some were brought to New York as early as 
1804, but the first large shipment did not arrive there 
till 1866. Now this fruit is one of the most important 
foods of the entire country. It is supposed that bananas 
were a staple product of the Indians of Peru, when the 
Spaniards first arrived there in the sixteenth century. 
They were early cultivated in tropical America for food 
purposes. 

Pineapples. — The pineapple, which the fastidious 
English monarch, Charles II, called the most delicious 
fruit of all America, is also a native of the western 
world. It is. now raised in every part of the tropics, 
but particularly in the new American possession, the 
Hawaiian Islands, where it grows luxuriantly. 


FOREIGN FRUITS 

Oranges and Lemons. — Both oranges and lemons 
were known to the early Greeks and Romans, and prob¬ 
ably originated in India or China. Oranges, “ the golden 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


79 


apples,” “ the apples of Hesperides ” of classical an¬ 
tiquity, were common in Europe in the sixteenth century, 
and were first planted in America by the soldiers of 
Cortez in Mexico in 1550. The present California or¬ 
anges were imported from Brazil about half a century 
ago. The orange groves of Florida date from the period 
immediately after the Civil War. Grape-fruit, derived 
from oranges, were first brought to the West Indies.in 
the seventeenth century, but not until recent years have 
they been greatly developed. 

Peaches and Pears.—With the exception of the El- 
berta peach, which was developed in the State of Georgia 
within the last forty years, all peaches and pears of 
today hail from Europe and Asia. Both of these fruits 
were brought into the American colonies at an early date. 

Other Importations. — Three other foreign fruits 
have been eminently successful in the United States. 
California now vies with the countries bordering on the 
Mediterranean Sea for the honor of being the world’s 
great center of the cultivation of olives. From the 
same Pacific state, too, now come over one-half of the 
figs used in the entire country. Almonds, also, are ex¬ 
tensively raised on the Pacific. 

The Modern Fruits. — The list of the fruits developed 
in the nineteenth century, which the early settlers of 
America and even George Washington never enjoyed, is 
a long one, Catawba, Concord, Delaware, and Niagara 
grapes; most of our present apples; strawberries, rasp¬ 
berries, blackberries, gooseberries, and cranberries; and 
tomatoes and bananas. 


80 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


THE FOREST TREES 

Trees Familiar to Europeans. — The newcomers from 
Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries found 
in the virgin forests of America many trees with which 
they were already familiar. These included the lindens, 
maples, locusts, ashes, mulberries, walnuts, birches, oaks, 
beech, chestnuts, willows, poplars, pines, firs, hemlocks, 
and spruces. 

New Trees Found. — New trees, which the Europeans 
had never seen before, included the American elm, which 
is quite different from the English elm, the buckeye, the 
sycamore, the shagbark hickory and other hickories, the 
tulip tree, the sumachs, honey locust, persimmon, and 
catalpa. The fine grained and very hard mahogany 
wood, which takes a beautiful polish, is from a tree which 
the Europeans first found in the American tropics. 

Imported Trees. — The horse chestnut is a native of 
Greece, which spread to the rest of Europe in the sev¬ 
enteenth century and from thence to America. It is 
quite different from the native Ohio buckeye. From 
Europe have come two ornamental maples, the Norway 
maple and the sycamore maple, which hold their leaves 
two weeks longer than the native maples; also the white 
or silver-leafed poplar, and the Lombardy poplar. The 
last named, the first ornamental tree carried across the 
Atlantic, was very fashionable in America a century 
ago. Two trees have come from China, the ailanthus 
and the gingko; and from England, the English elm. 

The Oldest Trees in the World. — The oldest trees in 
the world, in fact the oldest living things in existence, 
are the giant redwoods or sequoias of California. Sci¬ 
entists, who have cut them down and estimated their 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


81 



California Red Wood 



82 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


age by the rings which spread out from the center of 
their mighty trunks, affirm that many of these mon- 
archs of the forest are from 1500 to 2500 years old. One 
is certainly over 3,000 years old and another has been 
put at 4,000. The Grizzly Giant is 204 feet high and 
30 feet in diameter at the base; the General Grant is 
264 feet high and nearly 35 feet in diameter; and the 
General Sherman, the largest known, 280 feet high, 36 
feet 5 inches in diameter, and 5,000 years old. Wide 
roadways for carriages and motors have been built 
through their trunks; and every year thousands of 
visitors stand with reverence before their dignity and 
majesty. The Mariposa Grove in Yosemite Valley, east 
of San Francisco, containing 500 monsters, was discov¬ 
ered as late as 1857 by Galen Clark. There are several 
other smaller groves of redwoods in the same valley, and 
many more in northern California and in Oregon. The 
Spaniards probably never knew of the existence of any 
of these. Thousands of years ago the redwoods flour¬ 
ished in various parts of the world, but they are found 
now only in limited sections of the Pacific coast. 

Valuable Products of the Native Forests. — Quinine, 
the.world’s great specific for keeping down fever, is a 
native American product, found very early by the Span¬ 
iards in Peru, and obtained from the bark of a certain 
evergreen tree or shrub which grows in the Andes Moun¬ 
tains. Arrowroot, used to absorb poison from wounds, 
was found in the West Indies. Vanilla, the popular 
flavoring extract, is derived from the pod of an ivy-like 
plant that twines about the trees of tropical America. 
Cayenne pepper is from the dried and ground seeds and 
pods of American capsicum, and chocolate and cocoa, 
“ the Indian nectar,” are from the seed of the tropical 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


83 


American cacao tree. The shrubby indigo plant of the 
old world, from which was obtained the famous blue 
dye, w’as also found in the West Indies; American indigo 
was an important article of commerce throughout the 
colonial period. Caoutchouc, Indian rubber, or gum 
elastic, a milky resinous juice, which coagulates on ex¬ 
posure to air and becomes elastic and waterproof, was 
first extracted from a tree in Brazil early in the eight¬ 
eenth century. It is now gathered from various trees 
and shrubs in many different parts of the world. The 
new substance was first used to erase lead pencil marks 
during the opening years of the American Revolution. 
A totally new use was found for it about a quarter of a 
century later when it was discovered that it would ren¬ 
der garments waterproof. Hardened and rendered more 
durable and adaptable for use in various shapes by 
being treated with sulphur and subjected to great heat, 
caoutchouc now renders service to mankind in countless 
ways. This hardening process, known as vulcanization, 
was invented by an American, Charles Goodyear, in the 
nineteenth century. Brazil wood, which had long been 
used in Europe as a source of a fine red dye, was found 
in great quantities in South America. The country of 
Brazil was named from this product. 

THE BIG GAME ANIMALS 

Introduction. — The Spaniards did not care for the 
furs of the fur-bearing animals which North America 
offered them in prodigal abundance, but went off to the 
gold and silver of Mexico and Peru. Englishmen, French¬ 
men, and Dutchmen, on the other hand, were quite con¬ 
tent to leave the metals of the southern countries to the 
Spaniards, while they entered on long competition and 


84 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


even wars with one another for the possession of the 
fur trade. The millions of large and small fur skins, 
which the new country produced, brought untold wealth 
in the markets of Europe. 

Buffaloes. — American buffaloes or bison (to use the 
French Canadian term), a close relative of a larger bison 
that still survives in Europe, were “ the largest and, at 
one time, the most important of all America’s big game.” 
Cortez found them in captivity in Mexico in 1521, and 
his successors saw them on the great plains farther north. 
Coronado, who saw them in great numbers in the present 
Kansas or Nebraska, called ’them “ crooked-backecl 
cows.” The Frenchman, Joliet, met them on the banks 
of the Mississippi in 1674. Buffaloes were not found in 
early New England nor elsewhere along the Atlantic 
seaboard except in Virginia; but west from the Appa¬ 
lachians they covered the entire country as far as the 
Rocky Mountains, literally by the millions. According 
to Ernest Thompson-Seton they must have numbered at 
least 75,000,000. 

Buffaloes moved as few other animals have ever 
moved, in great herds covering many square miles. 
They were so numerous in the nineteenth century on 
the great plains of the west, that in swimming the rivers 
they often obstructed boats, and on the plains over¬ 
whelmed travelers, and stopped railroad trains. Though 
fierce and strong, the buffalo was the most stupid animal 
known to man. He was slow in scenting danger, but 
would sometimes stand quietly by, without showing any 
other emotion than stupid wonder, while his companions 
in the herd were slaughtered by the hundreds. His skin 
furnished serviceable robes to Indians and whites alike, 
and his flesh was a palatable food. The passing west- 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


85 


ward and the gradual extinction of the buffalo herds, as 
civilization has pushed on into the interior, have removed 
one of the most picturesque phases of frontier life in 
America. 



A Primitive Indian Method of Rilling Buffaloes 

Moose. — The large and almost grotesque American 
moose, which is now rarely found south of the Great 
Lakes, is a cousin of the elk of Europe. He was the 
most important game animal of New France. The ant¬ 
lers of the bull moose, “ forked like a stag, but as broad 
as a plank, and three feet long,” seem to have been 
made for battle. When two rival moose fight each other, 
the antlers easily become locked and sometimes the two 
champions meet a common death, unable to disentangle 
themselves. 

Elk. — Elk, the handsomest, the most dignified, and 
next to the moose, the largest of the deer family in, 
America, roamed the country in great numbers in com- 













86 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


pany with the buffaloes, but covered a wider range than 
the latter. The early traveler found them everywhere. 
Although Thompson-Seton believes that there were 10,- 
000,000 elk in early America, few are now to be found 
except in and near Yellowstone Park. 

White-Tailed Deer. — Thompson-Seton expresses the 
opinion that there were originally as many as 20,000,000 



White-Tailed Deer in New York Zoological Garden 

white-tailed deer in the Mississippi Valley and in the 
country to the east of it, and millions more of other 
species of deer. The “ white tail,” sometimes called the 
Virginia deer, was first seen and described by an Eng¬ 
lishman in Virginia in 1584. Once seen fleeing in the 
forest, he is seldom forgotten. His flesh makes, good 
meat and his skin a good robe. Laws have been made 
to protect his existence, so that he still survives in many 
states. It is estimated that there are 100,000 deer in 
the state of Maine alone. 





AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


87 


THE SMALL FUR-BEARING ANIMALS 

The Beaver. — The most valuable of the smaller fur¬ 
bearing animals was the American beaver, which closely 
resembles a related species in Europe. It was found by 
the first settlers quite uniformly scattered over the con¬ 
tinent. Possibly the primitive beaver population was 
10,000,000. His skill in building dams, lakes, and canals, 



Beaver in New York Zoological Garden 


his felling of trees by gnawing, and his storage of food, 
are commonly known. But his valuable short and 
silky fur was and is the beaver’s greatest claim to fame. 
The trappers have decimated his ranks by hundreds of 
thousands, until he is now almost extinct. Says Les- 
carbot, in the book already quoted: “ As for the hunt¬ 
ing of the beaver, it is also carried on chiefly in winter, 
for two reasons; one of them (the necessity of winter 





88 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


food) we have given above, the other is that after winter 
this beast sheds his coat, and has no fur in summer. . . . 
The beaver is a beast very near as big as a shorn sheep, 
the young ones being less; the color of his hair is chest¬ 
nut, his feet are short, the fore feet have claws, and 
the hind feet are webbed, as with geese; the tail is as 
it were scaled, and almost the form of a sole, notwith¬ 
standing the scale does not come off. It is the best 
and most delicate part of the beast. As for the head, 
it is short and almost round, with two ranks of 
jaws at the side, and in front four great cutting teeth 
close together, two above and two beneath. With these 
teeth he cuts small trees and poles in small pieces, with 
which he builds his house. That which I now go on to 
tell is admirable and incredible. This creature dwells 
upon the borders of the lakes, and there he first makes 
his couch with straw or other things fit to lie upon, as 
well for him as for his female; raises a vaulted roof with 
cut and prepared wood, which roof he covers with turf, 
in such sort that no wind enters, forasmuch as all is 
covered and shut up except one hole which leads under 
the water, and by that he goes forth to walk where he 
listeth. And because the waters of the lake sometimes 
rise, he constructs a chamber above the lower dwelling, 
wherein to retire, in case of flood; in such sort, that 
some beavers’ cabins are above eight feet high, all made 
of wood, pyramid-wise, and daubed with mud. More¬ 
over, it is believed that being amphibious, as we have 
said, he must always keep in touch with the water, and 
have his tail dipped in it; which is the cause why he 
lodges so near a lake. But being subtle, he is not 
content with what we have described, but has another 
issue into another place out of the lake, without any 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


89 


cabin, by which way he goes on land and beguiles the 
hunter. But our savages, being well aware of this, take 
order thereto, and stop his passage. . . . His flesh is 
very good, almost as if it were mutton.” 

The Muskrat. — The muskrat was an animal alto¬ 
gether new to Europeans. It is three or four times the 
size of a house rat, but somewhat smaller than the 



Muskrat in New York Zoological Garden 


beaver, which it resembles except for the latter’s charac¬ 
teristic tail. A Frenchman named Denys wrote of it in 
1672: “ Its element is the water, but it nevertheless 
sometimes goes on land. It has a flat tail, eight or ten 
inches long and a finger-breadth wide, covered with 
little black scales. The skin is reddish to dark brown 
in color. Its fur is very fine and somewhat long.” De¬ 
spite the trappers, the muskrat still survives in large 
numbers. 






90 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


The Mink. — The American mink, with his long, slen¬ 
der body, weighing about two pounds, and with his 
valuable dark brown, almost black fur, closely re¬ 
sembles a European species. He was found widely dis¬ 
tributed in early America, always preferring the abodes 
of men. Like the muskrat, he still inhabits his original 
haunts despite the trapper. Says Denys, “ Both of them 
(minks and weasels) war against birds, large and small, 
against hens, pigeons, and all that they can catch. They 
enter freely into dwellings.” 

The Marten. — The marten was another native ani¬ 
mal. He lived in the depths of the northern forests, far 
from the haunts of men. He has a rich, yellowish brown 
coat, and is graceful and beautiful, but fierce. In a tree 
he is as agile as a squirrel. 

The Lynx. — The lynx, a long-legged, short-bodied 
cat, with a short bobbed tail, and a very beautiful head, 
was well distributed over America and was easily caught. 
He is about three feet long, and weighs about 15 pounds. 
His hair is long, of a grayish white color, and makes 
a good fur. 

The Land Otter. — The otter, which was common in 
Europe, was also plentiful in America. He is a slender, 
dark brown animal, from four to five feet in length, 
frequenting the streams and lakes which abound in fish. 
He never has been very abundant, but has succeeded 
in maintaining himself. 

The Sea Otter. — Sea otters, distant relatives of the 
land otter, are heavy-bodied animals, about four feet 
long, and with webbed hind feet. They were found in 
the eighteenth century to be very common in the waters 
of the North Pacific. Thev much resemble seals, and 
have a beautiful black fur, which is very valuable. So 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


91 


many have been killed by hunting expeditions that they 
are now almost extinct. 

The Alaska Fur Seal. — Seals were at one time numer¬ 
ous both in Atlantic waters, on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, 
and in the Pacific, along the Alaska coast and the islands 
of Bering Sea. They have been almost exterminated of 
late years. The Alaska fur seals once gathered literally 
by the millions in the Pribilof Islands in Bering Sea. 
He is migratory, and succeeds with unerring instinct in 
swimming for two thousand miles and more from his 
winter home on the Pacific coast of North America and 
in the Hawaiian Islands, to his summer home in the 
Pribilof Islands, where the young are born. The males 
weigh from four hundred to five hundred pounds; the 
females one-fifth as much. 

DOMESTIC ANIMALS 

Introduction. — The domestic animals, which man 
now has about him in the United States, were practically 
all brought to this country from abroad. Valuable as 
they have been as sources of food supply and for their 
furs, native American animals, with two exceptions, 
have not proved susceptible to training to become man’s 
assistants in any capacity. 

The Llama and Alpaca. — The first exception is the 
llama of Chili and Peru in South America, the American 
camel, as it has been called. It was found in a 
domestic state by the Spaniards on the west coast of 
South America as early as 1544. It is a wooly haired 
animal, provided with peculiar feet that enable it to go 
safely in very steep places. It is related undoubtedly to 
the camel, but has no hump on its back, and is only 


92 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


three feet high at the shoulders. Its wool is valuable 
for weaving. The other exception, the domesticated al¬ 
paca of Chili and Peru, also found in a wild state, has 
sometimes been classified as a variety of the llama. It 
is of the size of a sheep, but has a longer neck, and a 
soft, silky wool, which is strong and straight and easily 
woven. 

Horses. — There had been a pre-historic horse in 
America in early geological times, but he had long been 
extinct. The Europeans had to bring their own horses 
with them. The first modern horse on American shores 
was introduced by Columbus on his second voyage in 
1493. All the large expeditions from Europe brought 
horses. De Soto on his ill-fated trip into the interior 
abandoned a number of them, which probably were the 
ancestors of the wild horses of the southwest and of 
the Texas “ ponies.” French, English, Dutch and other 
breeds were brought in from time to time. The aston¬ 
ishment of the Indians was indeed great when they be¬ 
held pale-faced men, astride intelligent four-footed mon¬ 
sters, firing off guns with the flash of powder. The 
intruders must have seemed like beings from another 
world, hurling thunderbolts of heaven. 

Cattle. — Columbus on his second voyage also intro¬ 
duced cattle into America. Spanish breeds soon reached 
Mexico, and became the ancestors of the later “ Mexi¬ 
can ” and “ Texas ” steers. Other nations brought in 
their own breeds. 

Swine. — The first hogs, too, were brought over by 
the second expedition of Columbus. These animals were 
generally allowed to run wild in colonial times, feeding 
on such nuts and roots and other food as they could find. 

Sheep. — There is a wild mountain sheep in the far 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


93 


west which man has never succeeded in domesticating. 
The first domestic sheep entered America with Colum¬ 
bus in 1493. From the earliest colonial times, wool¬ 
raising has been one of the leading industries of America. 
The breeds of sheep have been improved constantly, in 
order to produce a heavier and better grade of wool. 
The Merino sheep, which produce the best wool, were 
brought from Spain in 1810. 

Dogs, Cats, and Rats. — The Indians had a wolf-like 
dog, which has been displaced by imported varieties. 
Cats and rats, though not mice, came with the Euro¬ 
peans. The brown or Norway rat, now the universal pest 
of North and South America, in fact of the whole world, 
is thought to have invaded Europe from Asia in 1727 by 
swimming the Volga River. In the same year it arrived 
in England from Asia on ships, and its coming to Amer¬ 
ica by ship was not long delayed. 

Bees. — Says a government authority on bees: “Ex¬ 
actly when bees were introduced from Europe is not 
known, but considerable evidence exists which shows 
that there were no bees in this country for some 
time after the first colonies were established; also, it 
was not until near the close of the last century that they 
reached the Mississippi, and less than half a century 
has passed since the first were successfully landed on 
the Pacific coast. ... For important practical results, 
the attempt has frequently been made to introduce into 
North America the stingless bee of tropical America, 
but the attempt has always failed.” The common brown 
or German bee, now found in the United States from 
the Atlantic to the Pacific, was introduced in the seven¬ 
teenth centurv. The Italian bee was introduced in 1860, 
and several others later. 


94 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


BIRDS AND FISH 

Birds. — Denys, already quoted, describes eagles, 
hawks, partridges, crows, owls, robins, woodpeckers, 
humming birds, and swallows; and Lescarbot, also 
quoted above, speaks of song sparrows, thrushes, jays, 
swallows, warblers, doves, sparrows, and many other 



Turkey in New York Zoological Garden 

birds. Probably the first settlers saw almost all the birds 
of the present day, with certain exceptions. The most 
notable of these exceptions are the English sparrow? 
which was introduced into the United States from Eng¬ 
land about 1850 to destroy the worms on cherry trees, 
and the English starling, which was brought over about 
1900. Lescarbot speaks of wild ducks and geese being 
so plentiful on the coast of Nova Scotia that they could 

be killed with a club. “ We had onlv to strike them 

%/ 






AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 95 

down with staves without stopping to gather them up 
until we were weary of striking.” 

Turkeys and Chickens. — The delicious table fowl, 
the well known turkey, was found by Cortez and his 
men in Mexico in 1519. It was immediately domesti¬ 
cated in Europe, where it came to be known by the name 
of turkey, because people supposed that it came from 
ey y that is, vaguely, from Asia. In the same way 
Indian corn was for a long time known as “ turkey 
wheat.” When Sir Walter Raleigh sent his first ex¬ 
pedition to America toward the end of the sixteenth cen¬ 
tury, turkeys had already become a part of the English 
Christmas festivities. All chickens have been imported 
into America from abroad. 

Fish.—Says Lescarbot: “ I will only say that by 
the way of pastime on the coast of New France, I will 
take in one day in the places where there is abundance 
of cod, for that kind of fish is there most frequent, fish 
enough to serve as food for more than six weeks; and 
he that hath the industry to catch mackerel at sea, will 
catch so many that he will not know what to do with 
them, for in many places I have seen shoals of them 
close together occupying three times more space than 
the market halls of Paris.” 

Denys describes salmon, shad, trout, lamprey, smelt, 
sea-eels, mackerel, herring, anchovy, halibut, so great 
in number that one became tired of them and so huge 
that one could hardly credit it, so large indeed that two 
men could scarcely carry them on a barrow; skates, stur¬ 
geon “ eight, ten, eleven, and twelve feet in length, and 
as thick in the body as a sheep squid, haddock, floun¬ 
ders “ near the land or bottoms of sand where the tide 
is low”; lobsters “ on the coast around the rocks”; 


96 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


swordfish “ very good to eat, as large as a cow and of 
six to eight feet in length, with its snout a sword, about 
three feet long, and about four inches wide; and sharks 
and whales.” 

Fried oysters were a delicacy known to the early 
Frenchmen in New France. Says Denys: “ Men never 
go to this fishery except there are several of them. Some 
fish, another makes the fire, another shells the oysters for 
a fricassee, others place them upon the coals, two or 
three in a large shell with their water, crumbs of bread, 
and a little pepper or nutmeg. They are cooked in this 
way, and are good eating.” 

i 

Suggestive Questions 

1. Did the Indians have as much reason as modern farmers 
to keep their corn fodder? What new drinks became popular 
in the civilized world in the seventeenth and eighteenth cen¬ 
turies? Was sugar sought as a necessity or as a luxury? 
How did the Indians clothe themselves? From what country 
were potatoes introduced into the present United States. 

2. Are native or imported plants now the more important 
in America? Is the modern vegetable garden made up mostly 
of native or of imported vegetables? 

3. Why was it correct to call early America a natural 
vineyard? What was the great century for the development 
of new varieties of grapes? What did your grandparents 
think about tomatoes? Can your grandparents remember 
when they saw bananas for the first time? What various 
kinds of food were the early Pilgrims and Puritans able to find 
in fields and forests about them? 

4. What leading fruits have been introduced from abroad? 

5. What tree would you choose to be America’s national 
tree? Why? What important products have the trees of 
Brazil given to the world? Name the leading forest products 
found native in America. For what is Charles Goodyear 
famous? 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


97 


6. Why did the Spaniards never care for the big game 
animals? Of what value to man were the big game animals? 

7. Name some of the small fur-bearing animals. Which 
have you ever seen? In what fur-bearing animal did citizens 
of the United States take renewed interest after the purchase 
of Alaska in 1867? Why? 

8. What domestic animals were found native in America? 
In what parts of America? What different domestic animals 
did Columbus himself introduce into America? Why may the 
common house rat be called the greatest traveler in the world? 
Why has he spread so fast? Are his travels good for man? 

9. Was any food early exported from America to Europe? 
What? Why? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the whites have been ungrateful to the 
Indians for what they have received from the latter. 

2. Resolved, That the new world has contributed more im¬ 
portant native products to the old world than has the old 
world to the new. 


Topics for Compositions 

1. The Buffalo. Wilson, Wild Animals of North America; 
Thompson-Seton, Life Histories of Northern Animals, I, 247; 
Hornaday, Extermination of American Bison, Report of 
Smithsonian Institution, 1887, II, 367-548. 

2. The Beaver. Mills, In Beaver World; Harpers Maga¬ 
zine, LXXVIII, 228; Denys, Description and Natural History 
of the Coasts of North America, in Publications of Champlain 
Society, II, 362; Hart, Colonial Children, 75. 

3. Think over this chapter, and write a composition on 
the benefits conferred on the whites by the Indian world. 

4. Corn and Tobacco. Hart, Colonial Children, 55 and 63. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The Fur-bearing Animals. Wilson, Wild Animals of 
North America; Thompson-Seton, Life Histories of Northern 
Animals; Roosevelt, Wilderness Hunter. 


98 


AMERICAN PLANTS AND ANIMALS 


2. The Native Fruits. Bailey, Sketch of the Evolution of 
our Native Fruits. 

3. The Big Trees of California. Our Big Trees Saved, in 
National Geographic Magazine, XXXI (1917); Saving the 
Redwoods, the same, XXXVII (1920); The Wonderland of 
California, the same, XXVIII (1915). 


Important Dates 

1493. Various domestic animals introduced. 

1849. Concord grapes given to the world. 

Books to Remember 

1. E. Thompson-Seton, Life Histories of Northern Animals. 

2. E. W. Wilson, Wild Animals of North America. 

The following books by Theodore Roosevelt contain much 
material on the wild animals: Ranch Life and the Hunting 
Trail, Hunting Trips of a Ranchman, Outdoor Pastimes of an 
American Hunter; also Hunting in Many Lands, by Roosevelt 
and Grinnell; and especially Wilderness Hunter. 

See also, How the World is Fed, by William Joseph Sho- 
walter, in National Geographic Magazine, XXIX (1916). 


CHAPTER V 


THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 

PRELIMINARY STRUGGLES 

The Inevitable Conflict. — A death struggle between 
the English and the French for the control of North 
America was inevitable from the first moment when 
these two strong rival nations confronted one another 
in New England at the opening of the seventeenth cen¬ 
tury. Colonial empire and trading advantages were 
at stake. From time to time, almost from the start, 
the colonists of the two powers sent marauding expedi¬ 
tions against one another, but did not indulge in open 
warfare till 1689. At this time hostility to France was 
a ruling political passion in England, on account of the 
welcome which the French accorded to King James II, 
whom the English had driven from the throne. For 
this and other reasons the two countries were now ready 
to fight, and the colonists were quick to follow their 
example. 

King William’s War. — King William’s War, 1689- 
1697, so named from the new monarch in England, came 
first. Terrible Indian massacres on the long frontier be¬ 
tween the French and the British colonies sent a wave 
of terror throughout the continent. In the middle of the 
winter of 1690, the little village of Schenectady, New 
York, w r as the scene of a fearful murder of sixty of its 

99 


100 THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 


inhabitants at the hands of French and Indians. The 
fiends, who had come all the way from Canada on their 
dreadful mission, fell upon their victims in the night, 
and before morning every house was in ashes. A few 
survivors only escaped over the snow to Albany. Haver¬ 
hill, Massachusetts, suffered similarly; here one of 
the captives, Hannah Dustin, succeeded one night in 
killing nine of her twelve savage captors and in making 
her escape. The whole country witnessed a reenact¬ 
ment of the awful scenes of the Indian fighting of King 
Philip’s War, then but fifteen years in the past and 
still fresh in the minds of all. Only now one of the 
European combatants, the French, took upon them¬ 
selves the terrible responsibility of calling the savages 
to their aid. Neither side gained any territory in this 
war at the expense of the other. 

Queen Anne’s War. — A second war, Queen Anne’s 
War, named from the ruling monarch in England, raged 
from 1702 to 1713. More massacres followed on the 
frontier. The English made their first territorial gain 
over the French by wresting from them the northern en¬ 
trance to the great French empire in the interior. This 
was accomplished by the annexation to the Crown of 
Great Britain of the two provinces of Acadia and New r - 
foundmnd, which guard the two entrances to the Gulf 
of St. Lawrence. 

The Southern Entrance to the French Empire in 
America. — The French had already taken the first steps 
toward securing the mouth of the Mississippi in the 
south, before the entrance to the St. Law r rence in the 
north was lost. In the south their rivals were the Span¬ 
iards, who had by this time driven away every survivor 
of La Salle’s ill-fated enterprise in Texas, and then 


THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 


101 


had proceeded to build the Spanish post of Pensacola 
near Mobile Bay in 1698. The next year, under Iber¬ 
ville, the French effected several settlements on Mobile 
Bay, all before they had lost the mouth of the St. Law- 


North America in 1713 



rence. The set-back in the north seemed to render a 
secure entrance to their interior empire, by way of Loui¬ 
siana and the mouth of the Mississippi, all the more 
essential to the French. They sent a number of expedi- 

































































































102 THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 


tions through Texas, and under a great leader, Bienville, 
founded Natchitoches on the Red River in 1717, and New 
Orleans, near the mouth of the Mississippi, in 1718. It 
would demand great diligence and energy on the part 
of the French to maintain the long line of communica¬ 
tion between the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Gulf of 
Mexico. 

The French Communications and Forts. — The most 
important route between Canada and Louisiana was 
that blazed by Champlain up the St. Lawrence to the 
Ottawa, and up the Ottawa and over a short portage 
to the waters of Lake Huron, the farthest point 
reached by Champlain. From this point the way 
led through the Sault Ste. Marie to Lake Michigan, 
and over this to the Fox and the Wisconsin rivers; 
thence to the Mississippi and southward. This was the 
route of Joliet and Marquette. The way was guarded 
by several forts west of Montreal, especially on Lake 
Huron and at the mouth of the Fox. Sometimes the 
voyaging Frenchmen left Lake Michigan at its 
southern end, at an Indian settlement called “ Chica- 
gou.” From this point a small river, now known as 
the Chicago River, and a short ford, took them to the 
Illinois and then to the Mississippi. Fort Crevecoeur 
was erected on the Illinois. Later there was a more 
southern route, leading over Lake Ontario, past Ni¬ 
agara Falls, over Lake Erie to its western end, and on 
to the Mississippi by way of the Maumee, a short port¬ 
age, the Wabash, and the Ohio. Various forts guarded 
this route, Fort Frontenac on Lake Ontario, Fort Ni¬ 
agara at the point where the Niagara River empties 
into Lake Ontario, several west of Lake Erie, and one 
at the mouth of the Ohio. 


THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 103 

King George’s War. — In a third war, King George’s 
War, named from the ruling English King and lasting 
from 1744 to 1748, there were no exchanges of terri¬ 
tory, but there were innumerable French-Indian raids 
of unusual ferocity. From Crown Point on the lower 
part of Lake Champlain, where the French built a fort 
in 1731, the French and Indians in this war made 
twenty-seven marauding expeditions against the Eng¬ 
lish settlers of northern New York and New England, 
destroying upwards of thirty new settlements. 


THE SEVEN YEARS WAR 

Mutual Jealousy over the Ohio Valley. — The close 
of the third war, instead of bringing settled peace, 
ushered in only a breathing spell that was to last till 

the last and final tug of war, which all were sure was 

• _ 

bound to come. The immediate bone of contention 
was the valley of the Ohio, into which English traders 
began to pour just before 1750. The valley led the 
way to the Mississippi, and, under the control of the 
English, would effectually cut the encircling empire of 
the French in two. That rival power saw what was 
threatening them, and made preparations to defend 
themselves. In 1749 they sent Celoron from Fort Ni¬ 
agara down the Ohio to warn the English away, and to 
plant various leaden plates, proclaiming the disputed 
country to belong to the King of France. The English 
paid no attention. 

The French Construct a New Route from the Lakes 
to the Ohio. — When the disquieting rumor reached the 
French that their rivals were about to take an advance 
step and build a fort at the head of the Ohio, the site 


104 THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 

of the present city of Pittsburgh, even at that time rec¬ 
ognized as a “ gateway to the West/’ the French re¬ 
taliated by a counter stroke. Under the governor of 
New France, the Marquis Duquesne, in 1753 they 
hastily started the construction of a new route from 
Lake Erie to the Mississippi, which left the Lake 
at the present city of Erie, Pennsylvania. On this 
route they built two forts near the lake. When warned 
to withdraw by young George Washington, the mes¬ 
senger of the governor of the English colony of Vir¬ 
ginia, they not only refused to do so, but pressed on 
southward and built two more forts. One of these, 
Fort Duquesne, was situated at the disputed “ gate¬ 
way.” A party of Virginians, coming up under the 
command of Washington to secure the “ gateway ” for 
their side, was driven off by the French, and their own 
Fort Necessity, a little south of Fort Duquesne, taken 
from them. 

There is dispute as to whether Washington and his 
men or the French must bear the responsibility of 
firing the first shot in this “ next war,” which had been 
expected since 1748. 

George Washington. — The young Virginian major, 
George Washington, now makes his appearance in his 
country’s history. He was twenty-one years of age, 
tall and handsome; and had already played a minor 
role as the English messenger to the French in western 
Pennsylvania, and the defeated commander at Fort 
Necessity. Like his father before him, he was a sur¬ 
veyor, neat, accurate, methodical, hard-working and 
resourceful. He had had much experience with the In¬ 
dians and with the wild life of the frontier. His first 
trip to warn the French away from the Ohio he accom- 


THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 105 

plished in the winter time, with a half dozen companions. 
The journey, especially the return in the midwinter, was 
unusually arduous, and afforded the leader abundant op¬ 
portunity to display his ability to overcome difficulties. 

The Albany 
Plan of Union. — 

Before the coming 
war, known in his¬ 
tory as the French 
and Indian War, 



was formally declared, the Eng¬ 
lish King called a congress or 
meeting at Albany in the year 
1754, to devise some plan of 
union for the colonies. The 
English were well aware of the 
.military disadvantages resulting 
from the division of their colonial empire into a number 
of separate colonies. At Albany, Benjamin Franklin 
proposed the Albany Plan of Union, which provided one 
central government for all. The plan was rejected, 
killed by the mutual jealousies of the colonists them- 











































106 THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 


selves, but it was an important first step toward co¬ 
operation against a common foe that made later union 
easier and more natural. 

Braddock’s Defeat. — The next year after the erec¬ 
tion of Fort Duquesne and the defeat of the English 
by the French at Fort Necessity, the English returned 
to retrieve their disgrace. They failed miserably. Gen¬ 
eral Braddock, who was in command of the British 
troops, refused to allow his men to fight from behind 
rocks and trees, each man for himself, in true Indian 
fashion. He insisted on fighting the battle with his 
men in close European formation. Had he followed 
the advice of George Washington, who accompanied 
the expedition and urged him to allow the men to fight 
after the Indian fashion, he would at least have stood 
an even chance with the opposing French and Indians. 
As it was, he lost his own life and that of many of 
his officers and seven hundred of his men. The battle 
was slightly east of Fort Duquesne, so that Braddock 
never came in sight of his goal. 

Outline of the Fighting. — After war was formally 
declared in 1756, the English took the aggressive to 
prevent the enemy from carrying the fighting into the 
midst of the English settlements on the seaboard. The 
French, who had dreamed of driving the English off 
the continent into the ocean, were forced to take the 
defensive and to wage the struggle for their very lives, 
in their own territory or in the disputed wilderness 
areas between the two lines of colonies. The fighting 
converged at the great French fortress of Quebec on the 
St. Lawrence. The English began their advance on 
this point in the year 1758, by capturing, in the east, 
the stronghold at Louisburg, which the French had 


THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 107 

erected on Cape Breton Island. In the west they took 
Fort Duquesne, which they promptly re-named Fort 
Pitt, in honor of the King’s leading minister in Eng¬ 
land, William Pitt. Fort Frontenac on Lake Ontario, 
where that lake empties into the St. Lawrence, fell 
into English hands that same year, and Fort Niagara, 
at the other end of the same lake, the next year. 

Lake Champlain. — Lake Champlain, which the In¬ 
dians called Caniad-eri-guarunte, the Mouth or Door 
of the Country, was a broad waterway leading from 
New York and from New England to the very heart 
of Canada, In particular it led the way to Montreal, 
which was the seat of the very valuable Indian trade 
of the French, the center of their warlike raids on the 
English settlers, and the most fertile part of the French 
province. As the lake did not abound in beaver and 
other fur-bearing animals, the English paid little at¬ 
tention to it till the French raids from Crown Point 
in King George’s War revealed its military advantages. 
If controlled by France, the lake was a spear in the 
side of the English colonies, while in the hands of the 
English, it would prove equally dangerous to the 
French. 

Ticonderoga and Crown Point. — The French were 
the first to seize the lake, building a fort at Crown 
Point in 1731 and at Ticonderoga in 1755. It cost the 
English two hard campaigns to dislodge them. The 
small wooden fort at Ticonderoga was surrounded by 
three hills, from any one of which the frail fort could 
be demolished by bombardment. In their first attempt, 
in 1758, the English trusted to an attack in front and 
failed utterly, losing two thousand men in killed and 
wounded. If they had planted their artillery on the 


108 THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 

surrounding heights and tried the reduction of the fort 
by bombardment, they almost certainly would have 
succeeded. The next year General Montcalm, the 
French commander, evacuated both Ticonderoga and 
Crown Point without a blow, and retired to the heights 
of Quebec. 



Wolfe at Quebec. — All the outlying posts having 
been reduced, Louisburg, Frontenac, Fort Duquesne, 
Niagara, Ticonderoga, and Crown Point, the way was 
now open for a British attack on the central point of 
Quebec. Quebec was a citadel at least 200 feet above 
the waters of the St. Lawrence, and was the strongest 
natural point of defense in America; still it was destined 
to fall before the invaders, like all the other French 
forts. The attacking commander was the young British 
General Wolfe. He was a fine type of British gentle¬ 
man, modest, brave, keenly intelligent, and, like George 
Washington, resourceful to the last degree. On the eve 






















THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 109 

of the final battle Wolfe recited from Gray’s Elegy 
Written in a Country Churchyard, 

“ The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, 

And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave 
Await alike the inevitable hour; 

The paths of glory lead but to the grave,” 

and remarked, “ I would rather have written those lines 
than take Quebec.” 



Quebec 


The Fall of the Citadel. — After various ruses failed 
to draw Montcalm outside his fortifications, Wolfe 
availed himself of the aid of French deserters, took his 
fleet by stealth up the St. Lawrence past Quebec, and 
in the night-time led his men from the water’s edge up 












110 THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 


a devious path to the elevated Plains of Abraham west 
of the city. In the crisis which confronted him at this 
sudden turn of affairs, Montcalm might have caught 
the besiegers between two fires by waiting for an at¬ 



tacking column of French to come up in. the rear of 
the British from the direction of Montreal. He threw 
away this opportunity, leaving his fortifications, which 
were impregnable, and posting his men outside the 
walls on the top of a high hill, with W'olfe’s men and 











































































































THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 111 

the British guns somewhat below him. Montcalm’s ar¬ 
tillery, left back in the citadel, could not fire on the 
enemy, for fear of hitting their own men. It was a 
terrible mistake for the French ever to have left the 
fortress at all. The engagement which followed was 
a sharp one, but when the first line of defense crum¬ 
bled, all was lost. For some unaccountable reason, 
there was no French reserve. Both Wolfe and Mont¬ 
calm were killed. With the loss of their commander 
the defenders were so disheartened that they not only 
did not shut themselves up in the citadel, which they 
had so foolishly left, but surprised the British by aban¬ 
doning everything to them. 

The Treaty of Peace. — The cession to the British of 
the Heights of Quebec, and with them, of the whole of 
Canada, as arranged by the treaty of peace, was 
one of the most momentous events in the history of 
the continent. It may be compared in importance with 
the defeat of the Spanish Armada in the English 
Channel in 1588, for it gave the British predominance 
over the French, just as the earlier victory had assured 
them freedom from interference by Spain. France was 
eliminated from the mainland of America, and the 
progress of Anglo-Saxon civilization was assured. 

By a separate treaty, France’s ally, Spain, was re¬ 
quired to give up Florida to Great Britain, while, by 
way of compensation, Spain received all the French 
claims to the interior of America west of the Mississippi, 
including New Orleans. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. Name the Wars between English and French from 1689 
to 1815. Which war brought England the greatest amount 
of new territory? What disadvantage was there to the 


112 THE ENGLISH AND FRENCH WARS 


French in the possession of such distant colonies as Canada and 
Louisiana? How did they try to improve the situation? 

2. What brought on the French and Indian War? Why 
was it difficult to get at the enemy in this war? What was 
George Washington’s part in this war? Why was Lake Cham¬ 
plain so important in this war? Give an outline of the fight¬ 
ing. What mistake did the English make at Ticonderoga in 
1758? What great mistake were the French guilty 
of at Quebec in 1759? Why? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That their policy toward the Indians was det¬ 
rimental to the French. 

2. Resolved, That the fall of Quebec was the most impor¬ 
tant military event in the history of the American Continent. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The Fortifications of Quebec. MacKellar, Report on 
Quebec, in Publications of Champlain Society. Historical 
Journal of the Campaigns in North America for the Years 
1757, 1758, 1759, and 1760. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. George Washington in the French and Indian War. 
Lodge, Life of Washington; Dana, Makers of America. 

2. Braddock’s Defeat. Avery, United States, IV, 60-79; 
Hulbert, Historic Highways, IV, 15-135; Hart, Camps and 
Firesides of the Revolution, 138. 

3. The Commanders at Quebec. Hart, Camps and Fire¬ 
sides of the Revolution, 146; Parkman, Montcalm and Wolfe. 

Important Dates 

1754. Albany Plan of Union. 

1756-1763. French and Indian War. 

1759. Fall of Quebec. 

Books to Remember 

1. Francis Parkman, Half Century of Conflict, Montcalm 
and Wolfe, and Conspiracy of Pontiac. 


CHAPTER VI 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 

POPULATION AND IMMIGRATION 

Population. — One reason for the success of the 
English over the French was superiority in numbers. 
The 2,000,000 English inhabitants, scattered along the 
seaboard and in the West Indies, outnumbered the sparse 
French population by at least fifteen to one. At home 
in Europe, on the other hand, France was ahead of 
England in wealth and population three times over. It 
was an advantage to the British colonies that they oc¬ 
cupied a compact and unbroken, even though narrow, 
fringe of settlement on the seaboard, in contrast to the 
less numerous French, who held a thin and broken line 
of settlements stretching for two thousand miles from 
the St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico. Moreover, the 
liberal English principle of permitting immigration 
of all classes and of all faiths stood out in bold relief 
against the opposite French policy of allowing only 
good Roman Catholics of French extraction to cross 
the Atlantic to New France. 

“ What is an American? ” — Crevecoeur, himself an 
immigrant from France, wrote the following apprecia¬ 
tion of the mixed character of the population in 
America in the last half of the eighteenth century; 
“ What then is an American, this new man? He is 

113 


114 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


neither an European, nor the descendant of an European; 
hence that strange mixture of blood, which you will 
find in no other country. I could point out to you a 
family, whose grandfather was an Englishman, whose 
wife was Dutch, whose son married a French woman, 







mmm 


i 1 



Colonial Stage Coach 


and whose present four sons have now four wives of dif¬ 
ferent nations. He is an American, who, leaving behind 
him all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new 
ones from the new mode of life he has embraced, the 




















LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


115 


new government he obeys, and the new rank he holds. 
He becomes an American by being received into the 
broad lap of our great ‘ alma mater.’ Here individuals 
of all races are melted into a new race of men, whose 
labors and posterity will one day cause great changes 
in the world. Americans are the western pilgrims, who 
are carrying along with them that great mass of arts, 
sciences, vigor, and industry, which began long since 
in the east. They will finish the great circle. The 
Americans were once scattered all over Europe. Here 
they are incorporated into one of the finest systems of 
population which has ever appeared. . . . The Ameri¬ 
can is a new man, who acts upon new principles; he 
must therefore entertain new ideas, and form new opin¬ 
ions. . . . This is an American.” 

Eighteenth Century Immigration. — The otherwise 
dull annals of the eighteenth century colonial history 
were enlivened by a continuous stream of immigration. 
John Fiske estimates that in this eighteenth century, 
prior to the outbreak of the American Revolution, 500, 
000 newcomers arrived on the western shores of the 
Atlantic. These were mainly Germans and Scotch-Irish, 
fleeing from oppression of various kinds at home. Fiske 
adds, “ Of all the migrations to America previous to 
the steamship, this was by far the largest in volume.” 

The Different Races. — New England down to the 
War of the Revolution was almost purely English. The 
same English race predominated in the seaboard sec¬ 
tions of the southern colonies. In the middle colonies 
of New A r ork, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Dela¬ 
ware, and in the Piedmont or western sections of the 
southern colonies, at the foot of the Appalachian Moun¬ 
tains, the English were mixed with the Dutch, Swedes, 


116 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 



New York Harbor in 1717. 

1. The Fort. 5. The Ruines of White Hall 

2. The Chappel in the Fort. . Built by Governeur Duncan. 

3. The Secretaries Office. 6. Part of Nutten Island. 

4. The Great Dock with a 7. The Crane. 

Bridge over it. 8. The Lower Market. 

Germans, and the Scotch-Irish. The so-called Pennsyl¬ 
vania Dutch were properly not Dutch at all, but Ger¬ 
mans. The Scotch-Irish were Scotch from the north 
of Ireland. 

The Spread of the New Population. — The chief ports 
of entry for the immigrants of this time were Philadel¬ 
phia and Charleston, South Carolina, principally the 
former. From Philadelphia, through York and Lan¬ 
caster, Pennsylvania, and on to the south by way of 
the Shenandoah Valley, through Winchester and Staun¬ 
ton, a highway was gradually opened up to the Yadkin 
River in North Carolina, 435 miles away. The new 
population passed down this by the thousands, into the 
western parts of Maryland, Virginia, and the Carolinas. 
Said the governor of North Carolina in 1766, “ I am 
of the opinion that this province is settling faster than 
any on the continent: last autumn and winter upwards 












LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


117 



Redrawn jrom a rare 'print. 


9. The Great Flesh Market. 

10. The Dutch Church. 

11. The English Church. 

12. The City Hall. 

13. The Exchange. 


14. The French Church. 

15. The Upper Market. 

16. The Station Ship. 

17. ' A Wharf. 


of one thousand wagons passed through Salisbury with 
families from the northward, to settle in this province 
chiefly. 

Efforts to Attract Population. — Religious laws were 
relaxed to attract the new population, tax laws were 
suspended in their favor, and enormous tracts of land 
were given them with no payment required and with no 
other condition attached than that the lands be settled 
within two years. The testing time of the Revolution 
in 1776 was soon to prove that the polyglot mixture 
produced very loyal Americans. 

The Proclamation of 1763. — Like other victorious 
nations, Great Britain after 1763 found it difficult to 
make a wise use of her triumph. One serious mistake 
was her Proclamation of 1763. This made certain 
changes in governmental arrangements in the colonies, 
and described a line which was to be drawn across the 








118 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 



sources of the rivers falling into the Atlantic from the 
west, beyond which the settlers were not to venture to 
take up lands. Those who were already settled in the 






















































LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


119 



ijitisbufo 


Harrisburg 


Cumberland- 


Redstone 

Fort 


Fredericksburg 


Richmond 


Jffi/rrf) )))■ 

wm 


KlngeCMoOntaln 


(irecowicb 


prohibited area were to withdraw. It was the royal 
purpose to reserve the western lands for the Indians. 

The Affront of the Proclamation. — The Proclama¬ 
tion of 1763 affronted the colonists, first, because it 








)wpens 












































120 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


disregarded the charters by which it had been promised 
that the colonists were to possess the lands to the west¬ 
ern edge of the continent. Second, because the men of 
the time, who had been chiefly instrumental in winning 
these very lands from the French, believed that their 
sacrifices entitled them to the lands. Third, and chiefly, 
because in many instances men and women were al¬ 
ready in motion to the west and could not be stopped. 
The King’s attempt to stop this tide was useless. 

Tennessee. — There were two waves of immigration 
into the forbidden country. One flowed down the great 
road in the Shenandoah Valley, while the other made 
its way up the Carolina rivers. The two came together 
in western Carolina, where desirable lands were quickly 
filled up. The overflow then passed through the Cum¬ 
berland Gap to the west. The Watauga River in west¬ 
ern North Carolina was reached in the year 1769 by a 
little compan}^ under the leadership of John Sevier and 
James Robertson. Here a number of settlements were 
established which developed into the state of Tennessee. 

The Wilderness Road to Kentucky. — A forward 
movement pushed on from Tennessee into Kentucky over 
the Wilderness Road, which was opened up by Daniel 
Boone on an old Indian and buffalo trail in 1774. The 
struggles of the immigrants on this route to Kentucky 
led one writer to call it “the longest, blackest, and 
hardest road in pioneer America.” The new road was 
in reality no road at all but a very narrow pass for 
foot passengers and horses alone. Vehicles did not 
pass over it for some years after its establishment. The 
Cumberland Gap, through which the Wilderness Road 
led, was in some places only wide enough for the road¬ 
way, on either side of which the mountain rose to a 





























































LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 121 

height of 500 feet. The distance from Philadelphia to 
the Falls of the Ohio at Louisville, Kentucky, by wav 
of the Shenandoah Valley, Cumberland Gap, and the 
Wilderness Road, was 826 miles. 



Daniel Boone 


The Buffalo Roads in Kentucky. — Of the first roads 
and buffalo paths in Kentucky — for its many salt 
springs and licks made the country a favorite haunt 
of buffaloes — one author has written as follows: “ From 
the Big Lone Lick buffalo roads led to Blue Licks, and 
also southwest to Drennon’s Lick, in Henry County, 
thence to the crossing of the Kentucky just below Frank¬ 
fort. From the valley of the river they then passed to 




122 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


the high ground east of Frankfort by a deeply worn 
road yet visible, known as the Buffalo Trace, to the 
Stamping Ground in Scott County, a town named from 
the fact that the animals in vast herds would tread or 
stamp the earth while crowded together and moving 
around in the effort of those on the outside to get inside 
and thus secure protection from the flies. . . . These 
buffalo roads formed in the comparatively level country 
the routes of the immigrants through dense forests, im¬ 
penetrable from the heavy cane, pea-vines, and other 
undergrowth. They also determined in many portions 
of the state not only the lines of travel and transpor¬ 
tation, but also of settlement, as particularly shown 
between Mavsville and Frankfort, a distance of about 
eighty miles, where the settlements were first made 
along the buffalo road, and later the turnpike and the 
railroad followed in close proximity to the route sur¬ 
veyed by this animal, which Mr. Benton said blazed 
the way for the railroad to the Pacific.” 

Kentucky Settlements. — The oldest of the Kentucky 
towns, Boonsboro, was founded by Boone in 1775. Lex¬ 
ington was settled in the same year just after the news 
was received of the opening struggles of the Revolution¬ 
ary War, which were then taking place in eastern Mas¬ 
sachusetts. Louisville was founded by George Rogers 
Clark in 1778. Kentucky’s 30,000 inhabitants of the 
year 1784 lived practically within fifty forts, which 
were clustered within a small area in the center of the 
commonwealth. 

COLONIAL OCCUPATIONS 

Agriculture Universal. New England. — On the sea¬ 
board and in the opening West, agriculture was well nigh 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


123 


universal. The New Englander, on his barren and rocky 
soil, raised the simple necessities but could boast of no 
great staple crop and no surplus supplies of food for sale 
elsewhere. His was a land of villages and small farms. 
He was familiar with the neighborhood settlement along 
the one long village street. Along this were gathered 
the surrounding farmhouses, each with the out-buildings 
connected with the main dwelling in one long line, for 
convenience in the long snowy winters, and for safety 
against the Indians. The farms stretched back from 
the street in either direction. There was the village 
green; the ever present meeting-house, and its tall spire, 
the whole white-painted and with green trimmings, and 
frequented by a people whose church-going habits be¬ 
spoke sociability as well as piety; the town hall, the inn, 
the school, and occasionally the block house for a 
stronger refuge against the Indians. From necessity the 
New Englander was farmer, trapper, lumberman, domes¬ 
tic manufacturer of his own utensils and furnishings, and 
Indian fighter as well. He was a practical, self-reliant, 
individualist, who cared little to avail himself of the 
labor of black slaves or indentured servants, but lived 
rather by the sweat of his own brow. African slaves 
were not sufficiently intelligent to cultivate the rocky 
and forbidding New England soil. 

The Southern Plantation.—Just as universal was 
agriculture in the South, but in entirely different sur¬ 
roundings and wdth different results. The Southern 
plantation was a large, self-supporting farm, with quar¬ 
ters much more extensive than in New England. As 
may be perceived in the accompanying airplane photo¬ 
graph of George Washington’s home at Mount Vernon 
on the Potomac in Virginia, scattered over the planta- 


124 LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 

tion were many buildings, the plantation mansion, the 
slave-quarters, the little school, the blacksmith shop, 
the carpenter’s shop, carriage and wagon sheds, and 


lUudtaUltf 



Wharf Scene on a Southern Plantation 
From an old engraving. 


other buildings. Nearby there was usually a stream 
of water, where, at his own wharf, the planter loaded 
his products for shipment and unloaded needed con¬ 
signments from abroad. As the culture of tobacco, 
the leading southern crop, rapidly exhausted the soil, 
and as very fertile new lands were cheap and easy to 
obtain, the typical southern plantation was many times 
larger than the farm in New England. Exhausted fields 
were allowed to lie fallow at intervals for recuperation. 
The greater heat of the southern climate, too great for 








LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


125 


whites to endure and at the same time perform hard 
manual labor, rendered the employment of black slaves 
common south of the Potomac. 

Negro Slavery. — The system of negro slavery, in¬ 
troduced into Virginia in 1619, continued on such a 
small scale that for many years white indentured ser¬ 
vants were more numerously found than the Africans. 



George Washington’s Plantation at Mt. Vernon 

on the Potomac 

The mansion overlooks the river. A modern airplane view. 


However, with the extension of the tobacco fields and 
rice swamps, the desirability of black labor gradually 
made itself felt. At the beginning of the eighteenth 
century 25,000 Africans were imported into America 
each year, and 47,000 in the single year of 1771. 

Agriculture in the Middle Colonies. — The same 









126 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


crops in general were raised in the Middle colonies as in 
New England; but since the soil was very rich between 
the Hudson and the Potomac, a surplus of wheat and 
corn was produced here for export abroad. Pennsyl¬ 
vania and her neighboring colonies came to be known 
as “ the bread colonies.” 

Fishing. — One of the most profitable industries in 
New England was deep-sea fishing. The supply of 
sea food in the waters adjacent to this section never 
failed. Fish were plentiful in the very early days, when 
the first French fishermen arrived on the Grand Banks 
of Newfoundland in the days of Columbus. When 
John Smith’s men made their great catch at Monhegan 
Island, off the coast of Maine, in the year 1614, the 
supply seemed inexhaustible. Hundreds of vessels re¬ 
sorted to these shores every year, the beginnings of an 
industry that still exists. 

The Indian Trade. — The Indian was always a trap¬ 
per, for to him the fur-bearing animals were a source 
not only of food but of raiment also. Not so useful 
but unfortunately much more coveted, were the glass 
beads and trinkets, the firearms, the woolen blankets, 
and the “ fire-water,” which the white man. brought 
to him. A fur for a bead, an armful of furs for a drink 
of “ fire-water,” all kinds of bargains the white trader 
wrung from the poor natives, whom they cheated and 
debauched most shamefully. Trade with the Indians 
for furs was a large industry in every part of the coun¬ 
try. John Smith carried away from New England in 
1614 beaver skins to the number of 11,000, and two 
Frenchmen who covered the territorv between Lake 
Superior and Hudson Bay some years later, returned 
to New France with 600,000 beaver skins, — only two 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 127 

examples of what it was possible for the white traders 
to accomplish in the alluring trade. 

Ship Building. — The large supply of ship’s timber 
and masts from the primeval pine forests, encouraged 
shipbuilding in New England. It was largely in these 
New England ships that the tobacco and other products 
of the south, the “ bread ” products of the middle col¬ 
onies, and the lumber and fish of New England were 
carried to Europe and to the West Indies. 



The Indian Trade 
From an old engraving. 


The Three-Cornered Trade. — The New Englander 
usually shipped his lumber and fish products to the 
West Indies, where with these he secured the sugar and 
molasses which he brought home and manufactured into 
rum. The rum, or rather that part of it that he did 
not drink himself or sell to the Indians, he would send 
to Africa for slaves, whom he then brought to the West 
Indies and traded for more sugar and molasses. Profits 
at every stage of the three-cornered trade were large. 






128 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


The Navigation Laws. — The Mother Country, by 
what were known as the Navigation Laws, tried to pre¬ 
vent other nations from reaping any advantages from 
the trade of the English colonies. The very desirable 
molasses and sugar of the French “ sugar islands ” of 
the West Indies were forced to pay heavy duties when 
brought into British ports. There were duties to be 
paid on certain articles passing from one British colony 
to another. Some things from America could not be 
bought or sold on the continent of Europe at all before 
a duty was paid in England. These were the hard¬ 
ships of the navigation laws. On the other hand, cer¬ 
tain “ enumerated commodities ” such as the tobacco and 
sugar of the British West Indies and the southern main¬ 
land colonies, were given an absolutely sure market in 
England, a monopoly in fact over similar products from 
other countries. This boon to the southern colonies 
did not touch New England. Still there "was favor 
shown by the Mother Country to the latter section in 
the right given to the shipmasters of New England to 
share in the carrying trade on the ocean, from which 
Frenchmen and the men of other nations were excluded. 
Also the duties paid in England on goods purchased in 
other countries, were returned in part when the goods 
in question were shipped to America. 

Manufacturing. — Manufacturing, save as carried on 
in the homes, never flourished in the colonies. English 
laws, which were even more selfishly designed in the 
interest of the Mother Country than the Navigation 
Law r s, forbade it. Iron, and wool, and other raw ma¬ 
terial might be sent from America to the factories in 
England, but could not be manufactured into finished 
products in factories at home. America was forced to 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


129 


import her manufactured products. There was, however, 
a permitted domestic manufacture in the homes, cov¬ 
ering blacksmithing, spinning, weaving, shoemaking, 
soap-making, candle-making, etc. 


EDUCATION AND GOVERNMENT 

The Colonial Schools. — In New England were Har¬ 
vard College, the first college in North America, founded 
in 1636, Yale College, founded in 1701, Rhode Island 
College (Brown University), 1764, and Dartmouth Col¬ 
lege, 1769. In the middle colonies, were the College 
of New Jersey (Princeton University), 1746, King’s Col¬ 
lege (Columbia University), 1754, and Philadelphia 
College (the University of Pennsylvania), 1766. In the 
south there was only William and Mary College, 1693. 
The public school system of New England had no coun¬ 
terpart at all in the southern colonies, and scarcely 
any in the middle colonies. In fact, the New England 
system of education was almost unique in the civilized 
world. 

Different Kinds of Colonies. — In respect to their 
government, there were three kinds of colonies. First, 
the royal colonies, such as Virginia, directly under the 
control of the King, who set forth the details of the 
government of the colony in a royal charter; second, 
proprietary colonies, like Maryland, Pennsylvania, and 
early New York, under the control of a single propri¬ 
etor, into whose hands the King gave over the ’reins of 
government; and third, corporate colonies, like early 
Massachusetts, so-called because the King gave the 
charter to a corporation or company which he allowed 
to be practically self-governing. 


130 LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 

General Nature of Colonial Government. — The gov¬ 
ernor of an English colony was the executive head. 



Harvard College, 1788 


whose duty it was to enforce laws, sign legislative en¬ 
actments, appoint officials, and perform many other 



































































































































































































LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


131 


administrative functions. The law-making body was 
generally composed of two houses, a lower house elected 
by the people and taking the point of view of the people, 
and an upper house appointed by the governor and 
sharing the political views of the govenor, which in 
turn generally reflected the opinions of the King. Some¬ 
times the two houses worked together in harmony, but 
as often they clashed. Disputes between the two 
houses over financial measures were occasionally very 
bitter. 

Finally there were courts, like the courts of today. 

English Interference in Colonial Government. — For 

the governor to veto a bill passed upon favorably by 
a colonial legislature, was a very unpopular thing to 
do. Instead of either signing or vetoing, the governor 
might send the measures to England for royal approval, 
which the King might give or withhold as he pleased. 
This was a galling procedure to the liberty-loving set¬ 
tlers and one involving inconvenient delays. From 
time to time, too, decisions of colonial courts were laid 
before courts in England for acceptance or rejection. 
Moreover the English Parliament definitely applied 
some of its laws to the colonies. If the Americans liked 
the law thus applied and thought it was advantageous 
to themselves, they were ready to enforce it, and more 
than once they did this. On the other hand, they ob¬ 
jected, when Parliament tried to force upon them laws 
of which they did not approve. They held that the 
decision in each case as to whether or not an English 
law should be put into effect in America, rested with 
themselves alone, and they would not recognize the right 
of the English Parliament, in which they had no rep¬ 
resentation, to force them in this regard. 


132 LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 

Local Government. — The town-meeting of New Eng¬ 
land served as a nursery of self-government and politi¬ 
cal training for its citizens from the beginning. But 
this institution was unknown to the South. Living al¬ 
most entirely on scattered plantations with no common 
village life, the Southerners saw no advantages in the 
New England system. It was too difficult for the 
plantation owners to assemble. Instead, therefore, of 
the election of town or village officials by the people 
in a mass meeting, the governor of the Southern colony 
appointed all local officials, the sheriff, lieutenant col¬ 
onel of the militia, the justice of the peace, and the 
coroner. The only part the people were called upon to 
take in their government was to elect their representa¬ 
tives to the colonial legislature, where the laws were 
made which these officials were to enforce. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. When the French and Indian War broke out in 1756, 
what parts of North America were occupied by Europeans? 
Why did Europeans like to emigrate to America, in the 
eighteenth century, or at any other time? How did America 
seek to attract settlers from Europe? How does an Ameri¬ 
can differ from a European in race? How were Kentucky and 
Tennessee settled? Why was the road down the Shenandoah 
Valley important in colonial times? What was the Wilder¬ 
ness Road? 

2. Why was it not natural for the Southerners to have 
town-meetings like the New Englanders? Why do you 
suppose roads were not so numerous in the Southern 
Colonies as in New England? Why was negro slavery more 
common in the Southern Colonies than in New England? 
Why was trade with the Indians so profitable to the Whites? 
Was it fair to the Indians? What was the three-cornered 
trade? What were the Navigation Laws? Why did not 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES IN 1763 


133 


Mother England like to have manufacturing develop in the 
colonies ? 

3. What were the leading colleges in Colonial times? Name 
the different kinds of colonies. Do you think that the King 
of England, when he came to appoint a governor of a col¬ 
ony in America, liked to give the appointment to a native 
American or to an Englishman? Why? What things in the 
English Government of the colonies were objectionable to 
the colonists? Why? 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That life in colonial New England had more 
advantages than life on a Southern plantation. 

2. Resolved, That the Proclamation of 1763 was a wise 
step for England to take. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. George Washington’s Plantation at Mount Vernon. 
Study the picture in this book; also Hart, Contemporaries, 
III, 49-53; Hart, Source Book, 91, 92. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Daniel Boone. Bruce, Daniel Boone, and .American 
Expansion, 1-23; Thwaites, Daniel Boone; Hart, Camps and 
Firesides of the Revolution, 101; Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero 
Tales, 17-29. 

2. Early Kentucky. Spark, Expansion, 88-103. 

Important Dates 

1763. Proclamation of 1763. 

1775. Settlement of Kentucky. (Boonsboro and Lexington.) 

Books to Remember 

1. Theodore Roosevelt, Winning of the West. 

2. Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography . 


CHAPTER VII 


PRELIMINARY QUARRELS WITH THE 
MOTHER COUNTRY 

. NEW REVENUE LAWS 

The Problem.—After the defeat of their French ri¬ 
vals, the British statesmen of 1763 were faced with 
tremendous problems. How were they to rule their im¬ 
mensely enlarged domains, what officials were they to 
send from London into the colonies, with what powers 
were these officials to be clothed, and particularly how 
was the money to be raised to pay the expenses of the 
late war? Should Parliament in England take the whole 
matter in charge and pass laws to meet the new emer¬ 
gency? Or should the wisdom and patriotism of the 
colonial legislatures be relied upon to enact the needed 
legislation? The Americans would have preferred to 
pass the new laws in their own law-making bodies, 
but England decided to the contrary. By her efforts 
to impose on America her imperial will in this matter 
she lost thirteen of her most flourishing colonies. 

Writs of Assistance. — To pay the heavy national 
debt which had doubled in a few years and then 
amounted to £140,000,000, was a pressing necessity. 
Some revenue could be obtained by a rigid enforcement 
of the tariff laws, which the Americans were wont to 
dodge by smuggling. Writs of assistance, or general 

134 


QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 135 


search warrants, were decided upon to the end that 
goods illicitly brought into the country might be dis¬ 
covered. These, when issued by a court to custom offi¬ 
cials, authorized the latter to search any house or 
building at any time for goods of any description. The 
Americans were greatly enraged by the invasion of their 
homes, and general search warrants did more harm than 
good. 

The Sugar Act. — A new tariff act, known as the 
Sugar Act, was passed, reducing the rates of tariff 
charged at the custom houses on molasses, but im¬ 
posing new rates on sugar, coffee, wines, silk and linen. 
Particularly irritating was the provision that those 
evading the law were to be tried in admiralty courts, 
courts appointed by the Crown, without a jury. The 
spirit of resentment kindled by the act was bitter in 
the extreme. 

The Stamp Tax. — A little later (1765) Parliament 
passed another tax law, known as the Stamp Act, which a 
great English historian has characterized as “ one of the 
most momentous legislative acts in 
the history of mankind.” The act 
required the Americans to place 
stamps, purchased of royal govern¬ 
ment officials, upon newspapers, 
playing cards, legal documents and 
many other articles. The promise 
was made that all the revenue se¬ 
cured thereby would be expended 
within America. 

The Stamp Act Congress. — 

Stamp taxes were not then uncommon. Certain colonies 
had levied them upon themselves, and Great Britian had 



British Stamp 






















































136 QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 


such a tax at home. In 1765, however, the Americans 
refused to pay the tax, because it was imposed by a 
lawmaking body in which they were not represented. 
They would not submit to “ taxation without represen¬ 
tation. ” In New York a congress of nine colonies on the 
mainland came together and passed a resolution that 
it was “ essential to the freedom of a free people, and 
the undoubted right of Englishmen that no taxes be im¬ 
posed upon them but with their own consent.” Few 
stamps were sold. After several stamp officials had been 
hanged in effigy, various stamp offices had been burned, 
and importations from England had begun to fall off 
alarmingly, the British repealed the act, within a year 
from the time of its enactment. 

The Townshend Acts. — Great Britain then turned 
to new tariff laws, called the Townshend Acts, which 
added tea, glass, lead, paper, and a few other things to 
the list of articles upon which tariff taxes had to be 
paid at the custom houses. Writs of assistance were 
definitely legalized by these acts. The non-importa¬ 
tion societies which were formed to press the boycott 
of British goods, were so successful that in a few years 
the royal officials in all the custom houses of America 
took in only £16,000 of revenue, which it cost £200,000 
to collect. The legislature of New York was suspended 
from sitting for refusing to make provision for British 
regular soldiers, who had come to the colonies in accord¬ 
ance with another offensive law known as the Quartering 
Act. 

King George III. — The stoutest supporter of all 
these oppressive measures was King George III himself. 
He was a man of good education and of tremendous 
will power and energy, but arbitrary in the extreme. 


QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 137 


When as a youth of twenty-two he was crowned in 1760, 
his mother had admonished him, “ George, be King! ” 
In strict accordance with the injunction the young mon- 



George III 

After a portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds. 


arch insisted on being “ every inch a king,” and on 
forcing legislation of which his people in general did not 
approve. 

William Pitt. — William Pitt, who had led his coun¬ 
try as Prime Minister during the last war with the 
French, sided with the colonists in the political dis¬ 
putes in the Parliament in London over what to do with 
America. He opposed the stamp tax. “ I rejoice that 
America has resisted,” he declared in a hot debate. He 
could not conceive of “ three millions of people so dead 
to all feeling of liberty, as voluntarily to submit to be 



138 QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 


slaves. . . . America, if she fell, would fall like a strong 
man. She would embrace the pillars of state, and puli 
down the Constitution along with her.” 

Whigs and Tories. — Not only Pitt, but Burke, Con¬ 
way, and in general the leaders of the Whig party, 



The Boston Massacre 
By Paul Revere. 

stood out against the measures of the king and the 
u king’s friends ” in Parliament, who were mainlv mem- 
bers of the Tory party. 

The Boston Massacre. — By virtue of the Quartering 
Act two regiments of English soldiers came to Boston, 
where their presence quickly caused trouble. On the 























































QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 139 

night of March 5, 1770, there was a collision of citizens 
and soldiers in the street following a false alarm of 
fire. The soldiers fired on the mob, killing five and 
wounding six others. The soldiers were then removed 
to an island in the harbor as a concession to the angered 
populace. But the list of grievances of the Americans 
against England had been increased by one. The re¬ 
moval came too late. 

The Boston Tea Party. — The non-importation soci¬ 
eties had by this time become very strong. American 
imports from England had been cut down considerably. 
Parliament, in an effort to please, repealed all the tariff 
taxes but the tax on tea. In course of time a cargo 
of tea arrived in Boston, but only to mingle with salt 
water. A great meeting of protest against allowing the 
tea to land, was held in the Old South Meeting House 
in Boston. Upon its adjournment the shouts of fifty 
“ Indians ” were heard outside the door. The crowd 
filed out of the meeting, and following, stood for three 
hours in the night while the “ Indians ” threw the three 
hundred and fifty chests of tea into the harbor, in the 
famous Boston Tea Party. The date was nine days 
before Christmas, 1773. 

The Five Intolerable Acts. — In 1774 Parliament 
passed five repressive acts to punish riotous America. 

First, the Boston Port Bill, closing the port of Bos¬ 
ton and removing the custom house there to Salem, till 
Boston should have paid for the tea which her citizens 
destroyed. 

Second, the Massachusetts Government Act, chang¬ 
ing the government of the colony, and taking away 
powers from the people. 

Third, The Administration of Justice Act, providing 


140 QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 

that those committing murder in Massachusetts while 
aiding officials in putting down a mob, might under 
certain circumstances be removed to England or to 
another colony for trial, if the officials felt that the 
accused could not secure a fair trial in Massachusetts. 

Fourth, a Quartering Act, renewing that of the pre¬ 
vious decade. 

Fifth, the Quebec Act, extending the limits of the 
lately acquired province of Quebec into the southwest 
as far as the Ohio and the Mississippi Rivers, thus 
taking away a great extent of territory from the lands 
which the English colonies on the seaboard deemed to 
belong to themselves under their charters. The good 
old English right of trial by jury was abridged in this 
province, and law-making was allowed without any 
representation by the people. 

The Gathering Crisis. — In Parliament Pitt pointed 
out to the King’s ministers the folly of their course. 
Burke thundered for “ Conciliation with America,” but 
the King and his ministers persisted. 


THE FIRST CONTINENTAL CONGRESS 

The Action of the Congress. — The whole line of sea¬ 
board colonies was alarmed, for it was felt that if Par¬ 
liament could thus lightly disregard the charter of Mas-' 
sachusetts, no one could tell on what other colony the 
next blow might fall. The common danger drove 
twelve of the colonies together in what came to be known 
as the First Continental Congress, which assembled in 
Philadelphia in 1774. This was not in any sense a 
formal governmental body but an informal meeting of 
delegates unrecognized by the law. The Congress was 


QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 141 

a perfectly loyal body, but nevertheless it expressed 
sympathy for the persecuted town of Boston. It also 
made ot non-importation a more forceful weapon against 
the manufactured products of Britain, pledging them¬ 
selves to what was really a national non-importation 
agreement. It pledged itself also in favor of non-con¬ 
sumption of all British goods, and even non-exportation 
of American raw products, which the British manufac¬ 
turers were very anxious to have. The boycott was 
carried out on an immense scale, and was effective. 

Samuel Adams. — The man of the times in New 
England was Samuel Adams. He was born in Boston 
in 1722, ten years before the birth of George Washing¬ 
ton in Virginia. During the troubled decade preceding 
the first Continental Congress he was a member of the 
assembly of Massachusetts, acting as its clerk. His fer¬ 
tile genius suggested the Committees of Correspondence, 
which ultimately enabled the communities in one colony 
to know of the doings and sentiments of other com¬ 
munities and other colonies through the medium of sys¬ 
tematic correspondence. He was chairman of the great 
meeting in Old South Meeting House in Boston, which 
adjourned at the coming of the “ Indians ” to be present 
at the Boston Tea Party. He wrote the stirring call 
for the First Continental Congress, and was an influ¬ 
ential member of that body. The title “ Father of the 
Revolution,’’ which has been given him, he richly 
deserved. 

Patrick Henry. — The most impassioned orator and 
one of the most influential men of the times was the 
young lawyer of Virginia, Patrick Henry. Speaking 
against the stamp tax in the House of Burgesses in 
Virginia, he cried: “ Tarquin and Caesar had each his 


142 QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 


Brutus; Charles I his Cromwell; and George III . . . 
“ Treason! Treason!” came back the warning shout 
in an effort to stop him, — “ may profit by their ex¬ 
ample. If this be treason, make the moet of it! ” More 
radical than others, he exclaimed in the Virginia con¬ 
vention, preceding the First Continental Congress, 
“ There is no longer any room for hope. ... I know 
not what course others may take, but as for me, give 
me liberty or give me death! ” 


Suggestive Questions 

1. What was England’s greatest need in America after 
1763? Why did it arise? What did she do to meet that 
need? Why did the Americans object? What did they do 
to show their objection? Why have Americans always been 
grateful to William Pitt (the Elder) ? What important events 
centered in and about the town of Boston 1765-1775? 

2. What kind of a body was the First Continental Con¬ 
gress? Why did it meet? What did it do? Who were its 
leaders? 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the Stamp Tax passed by England for 
the colonies was justified. 

2. Resolved, That the First Continental Congress did not 
go far enough in its measures of opposition to England. 


Topics for Compositions 

1. The Boston Massacre. Hart, Contemporaries, II 
429-431. 

2. The Boston Tea Party. Hart, Contemporaries, II, 
431-433, and Camps and Firesides of the Revolution, 162; 
Avery, United States , V, 154-171. 

3. Samuel Adams. Sparks, The Men who Made the Na¬ 
tion, 47-79. 


QUARRELS WITH THE MOTHER COUNTRY 143 


Topics for Further Study 

1. The Quebec Act. Coffin, The Province of Quebec and 
the Early American Revolution. 

Important Dates 

1765. The Stamp Act. 

1773. Boston Tea Party. 

1774. First Continental Congress. 

Books to Remember 

1. W. E. H. Lecky, The American Revolution. 

2. Sir G. E. Trevelyan, The American Revolution. 

(These two books are written from the British standpoint.) 


CHAPTER VIII 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 

THE FIRST BLOWS OF WAR 

A Tense Situation. — With Massachusetts suffering 
under the strict discipline of the Intolerable Acts, and 
with the town of Boston filled with red-coats, as the 
British soldiers were called, from their scarlet jackets, 
the situation in eastern Massachusetts rapidly took on 
a military aspect. The soldiers began to throw up 
earthworks, and in village after village the patriots be¬ 
gan to drill on the village green and to gather stores of 
ammunition, firearms and bayonets. 

The Battle of Concord and Lexington. — Military 
stores of some size, the British did not know how large, 
were hidden in Concord, twenty miles northwest of Bos¬ 
ton. In an attempt to destroy these the British precipi¬ 
tated the Revolutionary War that was not to end until 
America was free. In the morning of April 19, 1775, a 
warning that the British were starting for Concord, 
eight hundred strong, reached the local militia of the 
surrounding towns, known as the “ minute men ” from 
their readiness to march at a minute’s notice. Paul 
Revere, waiting on the north bank of the Charles River 
near Charlestown, received the signal from the lantern 
which a fellow patriot had placed in the tower of the 
Old North Church in Boston, and galloped away through 
the countryside in the middle of the night with the 
news of the British advance. By way of Medford he 

144 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


145 



went, rousing the minute men in the sleeping villages 
all the way to Concord, while the British were on an¬ 
other road to the same destination by way of Lex¬ 
ington. The first op¬ 
position to the sol¬ 
diers, the first shot, 
came on Lexington 
green, when the 
British commander, 

Major Pitcairn, and 
his men dispersed 
fifty minute men 
under Captain Par¬ 
ker. Eight of the 
minute men were 
killed and ten 
wounded in the 
encounter. Samuel 
Adams, and the 
Boston merchant, 

John Hancock, both 
of whom the British 
were anxious to ar¬ 
rest, had been sleep¬ 
ing in a house in 
Lexington, but es¬ 
caped, thanks to 
Revere. The British passed on to Concord, and after a 
short engagement with four hundred minute men at Con¬ 
cord bridge, succeeded in destroying most of the war 
material concealed in the vicinity. Qn the way back to 
Boston, with the patriots firing away at them from be¬ 
hind stone walls and trees the expedition lost more than 


The Minute Man 
From the statue at Concord by 
Daniel C. French. Photograph Copy¬ 
right Detroit Publishing Co. 



146 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


a third of its men. The collision took place on Wednes¬ 
day, and by Saturday night the British were besieged 
in Boston by 18,000 
defiant Americans. 

The Capture of 
Ticonderoga and 
Crown Point.— 

Within three weeks 
great enthusiasm was aroused 
for the new cause by the an¬ 
nouncement that the two strong¬ 
holds on Lake Champlain, 

Ticonderoga and Crown Point, had surrendered to the 
“ Green Mountain Boys ” of Vermont and small detach¬ 
ments of troops from other sections of New England._ 
The loss of the forts and of large quantities of powder 
and ball stored in them, befell the British because they 
were too weak to fortify the hills surrounding Ti¬ 
conderoga and make a stand. The British gave up the 
fort without the firing of a shot, like Montcalm and the 
French in 1759. 

The Battle of Bunker Hill. — From a military point 
of view, the position of the ten thousand British soldiers, 
besieged in Boston, was not a strong one, since the neck 
of land on which the city stood was commanded on the 
north by the hills on Charlestown neck and on the 
south by Dorchester Heights. The situation was some¬ 
what like that at Ticonderoga, though- the hills around 
the forts on Lake Champlain were much higher than 
those about Boston. The British general, Gage, looked 
first to the north, and to prevent Breed’s Hill and Bun¬ 
ker Hill at Charlestown from falling into the hands of 
the Americans he sent three thousand men under Gen- 





















THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


147 


eral Howe to seize and fortify these positions. They 
found the Americans there ahead of them. In close 
formation the British charged three times up Breed’s 
Hill, the lower hill near the water’s edge, and succeeded 
in taking the height only because the supply of powder 
of the Americans gave out. The latter had indeed 
taken a rash step in advancing into the neck and 
fortifying it at all when they did not have command of 



0 1 2 3 4 - 

Battle of Bunker Hill 


the surrounding waters. If the British, in command of 
these waters, had stationed their ships at the narrow 
entrance to the peninsula, they easily could have cut 
off the retreat of the rebels, who, through starvation, 
must soon have laid down their arms. Defeated and 
driven away though they were, and though they fought 
without a national flag, the “ rabble of New England ” 
were greatly elated at the good showing which they had 
been able to make against the regulars from Europe. 






































148 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 

The Second Continental Congress. — When the col¬ 
onists met in a second Continental Congress in Phila¬ 
delphia, May, 1775, what exciting tales Samuel Adams 
and John Hancock were able to relate to their assembled 
fellow-Americans! The lantern and Paul Revere’s ride! 
their own narrow escape! the determined stand of the 
men of Massachusetts for their rights! Hancock be¬ 
came President of the Congress, and Adams was a very 
influential member. Other important members, who 
had also been members of the First Continental Con¬ 
gress, were Samuel Adams’s cousin, John Adams, Pat¬ 
rick Henry, and George Washington. Among the 
new men were John Jay of New York, Benjamin 
Franklin of Pennsylvania, and Thomas Jefferson of 
Virginia. 

Acts of War. — Roused by the stirring news from 
Boston, the men of the new Congress determined to 
accept the appeal to arms which events seemed to be 
forcing upon them. They took bold steps. They author¬ 
ized ten companies of “ expert riflemen ” to be raised 
and to “march” and “join the army near Boston”; 
made rules for the government of an “army”; issued 
paper money, set up a post office, published an impor¬ 
tant declaration of the causes and necessity of taking 
up arms, and advised the eol.onies to change their 
colonial governments into state governments. 

George Washington as Commander-in-Chief. — One 

of the most fortunate acts of the Congress was the 

selection of George Washington of Virginia to command 

the Americans at Boston. Alreadv famous because of 

%/ 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


149 


the military reputation which he had acquired in the 
late war between England and France, Virginian though 
he was, the new commander was loyally accepted by 
the New Englanders. Under him the people of all sec¬ 
tions were united for the common good. By his skill 
and patience throughout the winter of 1775-1776 he 
kept the patriot forces together at the siege of Boston; 
and in March had the satisfaction of seeing the enemy 
sail away to Halifax. Boston was delivered. The sud¬ 
den appearance of American guns on Dorchester 
Heights, gave warning to the British in the city that 
they w T ere in danger from bombardment. They pre¬ 
ferred to retire before such a fate came upon them. 

The Expedition against Canada. — Toward the end 
of the year 1775, at the order of Congress, the colonists 
attempted the conquest of Canada. They proceeded 
northward over Lake Champlain under General Mont¬ 
gomery. With Ticoncleroga and Crown Point already 
in the hands of the Americans, the lake proved an 
easy military highway into Canada. They took Mont¬ 
real at the end of the vear 1775, and advanced to the 
siege of Quebec, where General Montgomery was joined 
by General Benedict Arnold. The latter had made a 
wonderful march to the north through the almost un¬ 
known wilderness of central and northern Maine. Now 
the British in Quebec did what Montcalm and the 
French ought to have done in 1759; they remained inside 
their fortifications, whence the combined assault of the 
two American detachments on the last day of the year 
1775 was unable to dislodge them. Montgomery was 
killed in the attempt, Arnold severely wounded, and 
the expedition abandoned. 

George III Implacable. — The appeal to force made 


150 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


the King more determined than ever. He received the 
various petitions of the American Continental Con¬ 
gress for redress of grievances, which the Americans 
had sent in the hope of settling the quarrel without 
war, and in reply declared that the Americans were 
in rebellion, “ traitorously preparing, ordering, and levy¬ 
ing war against us.” All the royal officers and men were 
ordered “ to suppress the rebellion, and to bring the 
traitors to justice.” It was the last straw to the out¬ 
raged Americans, when the King hired 30,000 German 
mercenary troops, popularly called Hessians in America 



The State House, or Independence Hall, Philadelphia 


The Home of the Declaration of Independence, Liberty Bell 
and the Constitutional Convention of 1787. From an old 
engraving. 


because most of them hailed from the little German 
state of Hesse Cassel, to fight his battles against his 
American subjects. 

Independence a Gradual Growth. — Concord and 
Lexington, and Bunker Hill had caused men to begin 



























































THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


151 


to think of the independence which Samuel Adams, 
Patrick Henry and other bold leaders already were 
advocating. The King’s implacable attitude and the 
bold stand of Congress in the winter following brought 
matters to a crisis. 

The Declaration of Independence Passed. — On June 
7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia introduced in 
Congress the simple resolution “ that these United States 



are, and of right ought to be, free and independent 
states, that they are absolved from all allegiance to 
the British Crown, and that all political connection 
between them and the state of Great Britain is, and 
ought to be, totally dissolved.” After some waverers 
had been whipped into line, this resolution was passed 
on July 2, and on July 4 the longer Declaration of 



























152 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


Independence was passed, to explain to the world why 
the colonies insisted on independence. The momentous 
event, one of the greatest in the history of mankind, if 
measured by the success and worldwide influence of the 
republic which it ushered in, was proclaimed to the 
country by the ringing of the bell in Independence Hall 
in Philadelphia, where Congress then sat. Couriers car¬ 
ried copies of the document in every direction. Inde¬ 
pendence Bell and Independence Hall are now revered 
objects of pilgrimage not only to the patriotic citizens 
from every section of the United States but also to 
lovers of liberty the world over. 

How the Declaration Justifies Independence. — The 
Declaration rested on the lofty principle “ that all men 
are created equal, that they are endowed by their Cre¬ 
ator with certain inalienable rights, that among these 
are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That 
to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among 
Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the 
governed. That whenever any form of government be¬ 
comes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the 
People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new 
Government, laying its foundations on such principles 
and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall 
seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.” 
A long catalogue of abuses then follows, the most im¬ 
portant of which have been enumerated in this book, 
to prove that Great Britain had “ failed to secure these 
rights.” “ We, therefore,” the document concludes, “ the 
Representatives of the United States of America, in 
General Congress Assembled, appealing to the Supreme 
Judge of the World for the rectitude of our intentions, 
do, in the Name, and by the Authority, of the Good 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


153 


People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare. 
That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to 
be, Free and Independent States.” 

The New National Government. — Even before the 
Declaration was passed, Congress began the consider- 
tion of a scheme of Government for the united colonies. 
Finally a plan, called the Articles of Confederation, 
was proposed to the states. This was adopted and went 
into effect in 1781. As a plan of union the Articles of 
Confederation were not very efficient because they gave 
too little power to the central government at the national 
capital. However, they sufficed as a temporary means 
of government 

Benjamin Franklin. — The best known American in 
1776 was Benjamin Franklin, a native of Boston and 
later citizen of Philadelphia. He was a printer, news¬ 
paper editor and owner, writer, and scientific investi- 



U NIT E OR DIE 


Franklin's Device to Encourage Union 
First used in the Pennsylvania Gazette. 

gator. His experiment with the kite, by which he proved 
that lightning and electricity were identical, and his 
Poor Richard's Almanac, filled with wise and witty say¬ 
ings, rendered his name a household word not only in 
America but in many parts of Europe, particularly 
France. As the agent of a number of the colonies he 
spent several years in England before the war broke 




154 THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 

out, but he returned in 1775, convinced that war was 
inevitable. His argument for unity in the Continental 
Congress, to win over the waverers before the Declara¬ 
tion of Independence, was that “ we must all hang to¬ 
gether or else we shall all hang separately.” He was 
the author of the Albany Plan of Union in 1755, he 


made certain suggestions in the final wording of the 
Declaration of Independence, and he framed a plan for 
the government of the new states after the outbreak of 
the war, which, however, was not adopted. From the 
birth of the nation down to his death in 1790 he was 
second only to George Washington in his ardent, patri- 


Benjamin Franklin 




THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 155 

otic, and wise statesmanship, and in the high value 
of the service which he rendered to his country. 

Thomas Jefferson. — Almost all the credit for the 
authorship of the Declaration of Independence must go 
to the scion of an old Virginia family, Thomas Jefferson, 
then only thirty-two years of age. Though so young. 
Jefferson had already achieved prominence in his home 
colony as a member of the House of Burgesses and as 
the author of several widely read pamphlets on politi¬ 
cal questions. His part in the history of America was 
to become more and more important till he reached 
and filled with distinction the place of supreme political 
preferment, the presidency of the United States. 

The New Flag. — For more than a year the new gov¬ 
ernment got along as best it could without any national 
flag; there were flags for separate colonies and some for 
separate regiments, inscribed with such legends as “ Lib¬ 
erty or Death,” “ Don’t tread on me,” etc. Then in 
the middle of the year 1777 Congress voted, “ That the 
flag of the United States be thirteen stripes, alternate 
red and white, that the Union be thirteen stars, white 
on a blue field, representing a new constellation.” Bet¬ 
sey Ross, keeper of a small shop in Philadelphia, was 
appointed by a committee of Congress, headed by Wash¬ 
ington. to make the first flag from the designs which 
the committee drew up. The present flag was the fortu¬ 
nate result. She suggested stars of five instead of six 
points, the number chosen by Washington; and she con¬ 
tinued as flag-maker for the United States for several 
years. The first flag over a military post was put up 
at Fort Schuyler, near Rome, New York, while John 
Paul Jones is supposed to have raised the new flag for 
the first time on the sea, on his ship, the Ranger. 


156 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


A change in the flag came in 1795, when two stripes 
and two stars were added for the new states of Ver¬ 
mont and Kentucky. In 1818, after certain other states 
had been admitted, Congress voted to return to the 
thirteen stripes of the original flag, one for each origi¬ 
nal state, and to add a new star for each new state. 
This arrangement has proved permanent. 


THE WAR IN THE MIDDLE STATES 

Shifting the Scene of War. — After the evacuation 
of Boston, the scene of war shifted to the Middle States, 
which were to be the leading theater of military oper¬ 
ations for the next two vears. 

%/ 

The British Hold New York. — In order to gain con¬ 
trol of the route to Canada, by way of the Hudson 
River and Lake Champlain, and if possible to cut the 
united colonies in two, the British seized New York 
and held it to the end of the war. Washington brought 
his army from Boston to the Heights on the western 
end of Long Island, hoping that he would be able to 
drive the British out of New York by his possession of 
these heights, just as he had driven them out of Boston 
by his seizure of Dorchester Heights. Unexpectedly 
the British followed him to Long Island, defeated him 
in a sharp engagement, and then themselves committed 
the mistake of Bunker Hill over again by allowing the 
defeated Americans to get away. If their successful 
army after the battle on Brooklyn Heights had been 
properly backed up by the navy, the British might 
easily have blocked Washington’s escape from the is¬ 
land and captured him and his entire army. But “ the 
sly old fox,” as the British came to term Washington, 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


157 


in a fog got his army across the intervening waters to 
Manhattan Island. From here he was able with some 
fighting to retreat northward to White Plains, which 
was a small town some forty miles north of New York 
and a few miles east of Hudson River. 

The Fighting in New Jersey. — Washington next led 
his men across the Hudson into New Jersey, where de¬ 
sertions began to reduce his forces terribly. Gloom and 
discouragement settled down on all; but however great 
the depression in the public mind, it was no match for 
the patience and resourcefulness of "Washington. An 
army of Hessians at Trenton, New Jersey, on the east 
bank of the Delaware, furnished him a great opportu¬ 
nity. On Christmas night of this year, 1776, shrewdly 
suspecting that the hated German mercenaries would 
be sleeping soundly after a holiday of revelry and drink¬ 
ing, Washington, who was then on the west bank of 
the Delaware river with his army, crossed the river 
filled with blocks of floating ice, and with 2,500 men 
pounced upon the revellers before they were really 
awake. He captured their entire force of a thousand 
men. Then, for the moral effect, he marched his pris¬ 
oners through the streets of the capital of his country, 
Philadelphia, amid the enthusiastic cheers of thousands 
of his fellow countrymen. The Americans beat a skill¬ 
ful retreat from Trenton to Princeton, where they won a 
second victory. 


THE PHILADELPHIA AND SARATOGA CAMPAIGNS 

The British Capture Philadelphia. — The winter of 
1776-1777, following these victories, was spent by the 
Americans at Morristown Heights, in northern New 


158 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 



Newburgh; 


West Point; 


^ains 


.Campaign in Middle States 

mm British 

a » Americans 
X Battles 

. _SCALE OF MILES_ 


Morristown 


Elizabeth 


ffa/itar 


unswicK, 


Princeton 


(.'Trenton 


hiladelphia 


Jersey, close to New York, 
and by the British in New 
York. In the spring the 
latter sent a force to 
Chesapeake Bay with the 
intention of capturing the 
rebel capital. Washington 
was able to slow up the 
advance of the enemy on 
his capital by forcing him 
to fight two battles, one 
at the Brandywine Creek, 


eekskill 


VAY 


o° 


Hook 


STROTHERS 4 CJ.'N.Y. 


near Chesapeake Bay, 
and the other at the 
town of Germantown, 
on the north of Phila¬ 
delphia ; but he was 
unable to save the city, 
which fell into the 
hands of the British. 











































■orris-town 


nswiCyR* 


Amfcrpy 


rentoa 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 159 

Burgoyne’s Invasion of New York.— While these 
depressing events were taking place in the south, the 
Americans in the north were brought face to face with 
still more discouragements and then at last achieved an 
overwhelming suc¬ 
cess. After rid¬ 
ding Canada of the 
Americans, who 
had gone there 
with Arnold and 
Montgomery, the 
English under Bur- 


Valley yr 


Chadd’s Ford^l 

is 




CAPTURE &. EVACUATION 
OF PHILADELPHIA 


British 

Americans 


X Battles 
SCALE OF MILES 


goyne had decided on a counter invasion of New York. 
Crown Point, which the Americans had taken in 1775 
without a blow, was now relinquished by them without a 
blow, and Ticonderoga likewise. Like the defending 
French general, Montcalm, in 1758, the American 































160 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 



0 10 20 30 

Burgoyne's Campaign 


general, St. Clair, in 1777, 
was guilty of not forti¬ 
fying the hills around 
Tieonderoga, although he 
had 3,500 men under his 
command. Whereas in the 
former case the attacking 
general was not shrewd 
enough to profit by the 
omission, in the latter 
case the attackers made 
the most of the oppor¬ 
tunity, and seized and 
fortified the surrounding 
heights. St. Clair decided 
that it would be useless to 
remain in the fort, with 
the surrounding hills 
bristling with British 
guns, ready to destroy 
him by bombardment. 

Burgoyne’s Mistake. — 
The British commander 
was now guilty of a grave 
error. Instead of pro¬ 
ceeding south from Tieon¬ 
deroga over Lake George, 
and from the lower end of 
that lake overland by an 
easy path to the Hudson, 
he foolishly followed St. 
Clair’s fleeing men over 
creeks that the fugitives 
















THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


161 


choked with rocks and trees, and over paths impeded 
in every possible way. Over one stretch of two miles 
he was forced to stop and build forty bridges. He 
reached the Hudson, only 26 miles away, twenty-four 
days after leaving Lake Champlain. 

The Surrender of Burgoyne. — A supporting column 
over the Mohawk River from Lake Ontario in the west 
never reached him. Help from the south likewise failed, 
when Howe, by some mistake, went off on the independ¬ 
ent expedition to take Philadelphia instead of going 
north to help Burgoyne. Thus weakened and deserted, 
and with his line of retreat back into Canada 
cut off, and harassed on all sides by the Ameri¬ 
cans, Burgoyne at last accepted two desperate 
battles at Saratoga on the west bank of the Hudson 
River, in northern New York. He then surrendered 
his entire force of 9,000 men. Only 1,000 prisoners had 
been taken by the Americans at Trenton, so that this 
success over Burgovne’s regulars was of infinitely more 
importance than the capture of the German merce¬ 
naries. It gave the xAmerican army new hope and con¬ 
fidence, and has been considered the turning-point in 
the war. 

The French Alliance. — The French, who had al¬ 
ready been aiding the Americans secretly, now came out 
into the open, glad of the chance to aid in the break-up 
of the American colonial empire, so large a part of 
which they themselves had lost to England in 1763. 
The miltary success at Saratoga turned the scales in 
France for the Americans. They owed much also to the 
diplomatic skill of their leading representative in Paris, 
Benjamin Franklin. Two treaties between France and 
the new United States of America followed, one of com- 


162 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 



Franklin at the Court of France 









163 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 

merce and one of military alliance. From now on, as 
the occasion presented itself from time to time, French 
guns, ammunition, and clothing, a French army under 
Rochambeau, and finally a French navy under de Grasse, 
were added to the side of the patriots. Individual 
Frenchmen, like the young Lafayette, had already joined 
the American forces as volunteers. From the European 
point of view, the war of the American Revolution, in 
addition to being a rebellion within the British empire, 
had now become a naval war between England and 
France; the fifth in the series of six wars between these 
old rivals between 1689 and 1815. As soon as England 
heard of the Franco-American alliance, she perceived 
the handwriting on the wall. In order to prevent the 
threatened loss of her colonies, she offered to give up the 
tax on tea and the right to levy any taxes at all on the 
Americans, except those “ for the regulation of com¬ 
merce.” The total amount received by such taxes 
she offered to expend in America; but she failed to 
offer independence, and the Americans turned their 
backs on the English representatives, who had come 
across the Atlantic with the offer. 

Valley Forge. — The winter of the alliance, 1777- 
1778, was spent by the British army in ease and gaiety 
in Philadelphia, and by Washington and his men in 
Valley Forge, twenty-four miles northwest of Philadel¬ 
phia, in great suffering. The patriot forces lacked sup¬ 
plies of every kind. The whole army frequently went 
whole days without provisions, said Lafayette. Wash¬ 
ington declared that their marches during this winter 
might be traced by the blood from their bare feet. For¬ 
tunate it was that General Howe did not march out 
from Philadelphia to Valley Forge and destroy the 


164 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


camp, as he could easily have done at almost any time 
during the terrible period. At Boston, New York, and 
at Philadelphia the British commander was inefficient 
in his royal master’s service. 

The Return of the British from Philadelphia to New 
York. — Possession of the rebel capital did the British 
cause no good, as they themselves recognized after one 
winter there. They returned to New A r ork in the spring 
of 1778, undisturbed on their march save at the drawn 
battle of Monmouth, in eastern New Jersey, a few miles 
from the ocean. 

Benedict Arnold. — Although active military opera¬ 
tions shifted from the middle to the southern states 
after 1778, an event happened on the Hudson some¬ 
what after that date that will besmirch the page of 
American history to the end of time. Benedict Arnold 
had held a high place in the councils of the Americans. 
He was in high honor because of the valorous leadership 
of his men through the wilderness of Maine to the at¬ 
tack on Quebec, and because of the conspicuous part he 
had played in the capture of Burgoyne at Saratoga. 
Washington loved him. Then a necessary rebuke from 
his commander-in-chief, as tactfully delivered as pos¬ 
sible, and chagrin over failure to be advanced in mili¬ 
tary rank as rapidly as some others, turned him into 
the blackest traitor of American history. No one knew 
better than he the importance of holding the Hudson 
for the patriot cause. Nevertheless, prompted by re¬ 
venge, he sought and obtained from Washington, his 
friend, the command of the important post of West 
Point on the Hudson, the seat of the present Mili¬ 
tary Academy of the United States. In his heart he 
had already determined to surrender the post to the 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


165 


enemy. His reward was to be a sum of money and a 
generalship in the British Army. The treachery was 
discovered when Major Andre of the British army was 
caught inside the American lines with tell-tale papers 
on his person, on his way back to his own camp after 
an interview with Arnold. 

Andre and Arnold. — Andre was hanged as a spy, 
though his last words were a request that he might be 
shot and not hanged. Arnold led various marauding ex- 



Drawn by himself the night before his execution. 

peditions for the British against his own native state of 
Connecticut. He died in poverty and disgrace in Eng¬ 
land twenty years later. His wife and family took up 
their residence in London, where his sons enlisted in the 
British army. The story is told that Arnold, as he was 
about to die, filled with remorse, called for his old uni¬ 
form, which Washington had given him, and put it on 
with the words, “ Let me die in this uniform in which 
I fought my battles. May God forgive me for putting 
on any other.” 



166 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


THE WAR IN THE SOUTHERN STATES 

The British Plan. — Defeated in the middle states, 
the British pinned their hopes of success on the southern 
states. In Georgia and South Carolina, those who sided 
with the King in the struggle were more numerous than 
the American patriots. They were sometimes called 
loyalists, and sometimes, in jeering reference to the 
King’s party in England, they were called tories. The 
British leaders planned to summon the loyalists of Geor¬ 
gia to their standard and to work northward. They took 
Savannah and Charleston, easily overran the surround¬ 
ing country, and defeated the Americans under Gates in 
a brilliant victory at Camden in South Carolina. Greene 
then took command of the defeated Americans, and, 
aided by Morgan, turned the tables by two terrific drub¬ 
bings which he administered to the enemy. The first 
of these battles took place at the southern tip of King’s 
Mountain, where this border mountain between North 
Carolina and South Carolina extends slightly over into 
South Carolina. The second was at Cowpens, also 
in South Carolina. A large part of Greene’s men in 
both these battles were westerners from Tennessee and 
South Carolina. 

Greene’s Strategy. — Greene next decoyed the Brit¬ 
ish commander, Cornwallis, across the entire state of 
North Carolina northward to Guilford Courthouse, far 
from the latter’s base at Charleston, and fought with 
him there a bitter drawn battle. Cornwallis then found 
his forces greatly depleted and was afraid to venture 
back to the south. So he turned to the north to catch 
“the boy” Lafayette, who had been helping Washing¬ 
ton for a number of years and was then engaged in 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


167 



? Richmond^ 

Petersburgh > 


Greensbora 


' So'wpe 

Spartanburgh . SsSjpTj 


ire'env.takes I 
command/ 

Hbbkirk’sX’ 

l JkmnX \ 

^^VbH (es 


Savannah 


guarding eastern Virginia. “ The boy ” always man¬ 
aged to elude the British clutches, and was himself on 
hand when Cornwallis 
was caught and the war 
brought to an end. 

The Surrender at York- 
town. — Cornwallis settled 
down at Yorktown, on the 
narrow peninsula 
tween the York a 
the James Rivers, 
where his fate 
depended on 
which side 


French 


Fleet 






a/ /est 


un 


REVOLUTION 

IN THE 

SOUTHERN STATES 

_ _ „_ British s_;_ _ Americans 


Nei * 5 


r' prom 


SCALE OF MILES 


WO 


could control the sea. He hoped that the British fleet 
would come up, and carry him and his army away to 
New York. Influence of sea power on history had been 
demonstrated in 1588, when the destruction of the 

















168 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


Spanish Armada in the English Channel definitely 
settled for all time that North America could never 
become Spanish in civilization. Sea power brought 
men and supplies to Wolfe at Quebec, and assisted him 
in his maneuvers in the campaign that determined that 



0 ‘J5 51 ICO 150 200 


The Yorktown Campaign 

North America was to be English and not French. 
Twenty-two years passed by, and on September 5, 
1781, a sea battle again determined the future of the 
continent. At the junction of the James River and 
Chesapeake Bay, between Cape Charles and Cape 
Henry, a little out to sea from the point where Captain 












THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


169 


John Smith and his men had landed to make the start 
of English civilization in the western world, the 
French fleet under Count de Grasse barred the approach 
of the British fleet under Admiral Graves, in one of the 
greatest naval battles ever fought in the western hemi¬ 
sphere. The result was that the most flourishing part 
of North America, though remaining English in civili¬ 
zation, was no longer to remain under English political 
authority,, but was to become the United States of 
America, a free and independent republic. 

Details of the Campaign. — Cornwallis’s escape by 
land was blocked by four thousand Frenchmen to¬ 
gether with some negroes from the West Indies, under 
Rochambeau, and two thousand Americans, whom 
Washington had brought by land and water from the 
siege of New York. Lafayette’s small force, which had 
been operating in Virginia, also gave aid. The British 
attempt to cross in boats to the opposite bank of the 
James, and thus to make their escape by land, was frus¬ 
trated by a storm at sea. Cornwallis signalled the sur¬ 
render of his entire army' of seven thousand men on 
October 17, 1781, four years after Burgoyne’s army 
had met a like fate. The surrender was formally ac¬ 
complished two days later. So far as fighting on the 
land was concerned, the Revolution was at an end. 

English Victory in the West Indies.— The greatest 
and fiercest naval battle in American history came in 
April of the next year, when the English, navy under 
Admiral Rodney administered a defeat to de Grasse 
and the French navy in the triangular space between 
The Saints and two of the other islands of the Lesser 
Antilles, too late, however, to alter the outcome of 
America’s Revolutionary struggle. In this final battle 


170 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


between the two rivals, seventy ships of w r ar were en¬ 
gaged for over eleven hours, and five thousand men were 
either killed or wounded! The terrible combat took 
place less than two leagues from shore, in full view of 
the inhabitants of the surrounding islands. 



The Surrender at Yorktown 


From an old print. In the background is Yorktown, from 
which the British troops under Lord Cornwallis are emerging. 
The British appear to be marching straight between Washing¬ 
ton’s Army on the hillside and the French forces near the 
water. The warships belong to the French squadron under 
Count de Grasse. 

John Paul Jones. — The United States was not with¬ 
out naval power during the war, for she sent out hun¬ 
dreds of privateers, or vessels of war which were pri¬ 
vately owned and privately equipped, to prey on the 
commerce of the enemy on the high seas and in the 
waters of the West Indies. Britain did the same against 
American commerce, and it has been estimated that the 
number of captures by the privateers of the two sides 
mounted into the thousands. John Paul Jones, a young 
Scotch immigrant, made the humble beginnings of the 













THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


171 


regular American navy by his exploits in the English 
Channel and along the other coasts of England. The 
battle between his ship, the Bon Homme Richard, and 
the English ship, Serapis, was one of the most thrilling 
exploits of the war. The latter surrendered, although 



John Paul Jones 


the Bon Homme Richard, on fire and with six feet of 
water in her hold, sank in a few hours after its victory. 

George Rogers Clark and the Northwest. — George 
Rogers Clark, native of Virginia and a young pioneer 
of Kentucky, made an easy conquest of the settlements 
in the territory northwest of the Ohio River in 1778. 





172 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


By his exploit he greatly enlarged the area to which 
his country could lay claim in the coming peace con¬ 
gress in Paris. Throughout he was assisted by the 
counsels of the officials of the state of Virginia. He 
occupied Kaskaskia in the Illinois country, on the east¬ 
ern bank of the Mississippi, then a village of 80 houses 
and 500 white inhabitants and 400 to 500 negroes; Ca- 
hokia, slightly farther north and also on the eastern bank 
of the Mississippi, containing 50 houses and 300 in¬ 
habitants; and Vincennes on the AVabash in the present 
state of Inidana, 150 miles from the junction of the 
W /T abash and the Ohio. 

A writer of the time wrote that Vincennes was com¬ 
posed of 50 settlers and their families. “ They raise In¬ 
dian corn, . . . wheat, and tobacco of extraordinary good 
quality; . . . and superior, it is said, to that produced 
in Virginia. They have a fine breed of horses (brought 
originally by the Indians from the Spanish settlements 
on the western side of the Mississippi) and large stock 
of swine and black cattle. The settlers deal with the 
natives for furs and deer skins, to the amount of about 
£5,000 annually.” 

Of Fort Detroit, which, though not conquered, went 
with the conquered territory, the same writer said: 
“ Fort Detroit is of oblong figure, built with stockades, 
and advantageously situated, with one entire side com¬ 
manding the river, called Detroit. The fort is near a 
mile in circumference, and encloses about one hundred 
houses, built in a regular manner, with parallel streets, 
crossing each other at right angles. Its situation is 
delightful, and in the center of a pleasant fruitful coun¬ 
try. ... For eight miles below and the same dis¬ 
tance above Fort Detroit, on both sides of the river, 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


173 


the country is divided into regular and well-cultivated 
plantations, and from the contiguity of the farmers’ 
houses to each other, they appear as two long extended 
villages. The inhabitants, who are mostly French, are 
about 2,000 in number.” 1 

The Treaty of Peace. — At the peace congress in Paris, 
where, as the English historian Lecky says, America 
gained “ almost everything that she desired, and started 

with every promise of future greatness,” the United 

_ $ 

States was represented by Benjamin Franklin, who had 
been minister of the United States at Paris throughout 
the war, and by John Adams, and John Jay. The 
treaty that was made recognized the independence of 
the thirteen colonies, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, 
Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey. 
Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North 
Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. The Atlantic 


Ocean was. established as the boundary on the east, Can¬ 
ada on the north (with certain complicated directions 
as to the location of the line), the Mississippi on the 
west, and Florida on the south. By separate treaties, 


1 The following by the same author, is of interest concern¬ 
ing the Spanish town of St. Louis, founded in 1764 on the west 
side of the Mississippi River; “Four miles above Cahokia, on 
the western or Spanish side of the Mississippi, stands the village 
of St. Louis, on a high piece of ground. It is the most healthy 
and pleasurable situation of any known in this part of the 
country. Here the Spanish commandant, and the principal In¬ 
dian traders reside; who by conciliating the affections of the 
natives, have drawn all the Indian trade of the Missouri..... 
part of that of the Mississippi (northward) and of the tribes 
of Indians residing near the Quisconsing, and Illinois Rivers, to 
this village. In St. Louis are 120 houses, mostly built of stone. 
They are large and commodious. This village has 800 inhab¬ 
itants chiefly French; some of them have a liberal education, 
are polite aL hospitable. They have about 150 negroes and 

large stocks of black cattle. 


174 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


Spain, which had entered the war as France’s ally 
against England, was required to give up to England 
Gibraltar, the great rocky point in Spain at the en¬ 
trance to the Mediterranean Sea, and received back 
Florida, which she had given up to England in 1763. 
The division of the West Indian Islands, so far as France 
and England were concerned, remained about as before. 



Fraunces’ Tavern, New York 

Here Washington took leave of his officers, December 4, 
1783. From an etching by Wm. Sartain. 


The Loyalists. — At least 100,000 inhabitants of the 
colonies, many of them leading citizens, who had 
remained loyal to the Mother Country during the war, 
now gave up friends, fortunes and homes, and went 
into exile in the West Indies, Great Britain, and 
Canada, rather than submit to the new arrangement. 
In the latter country these “ makers of Canada,” 












THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


175 



MAIN MOVEMENTS OF 
BRITISH TROOPS 

BY LAND AND SEA 


. or j-. 

_- -jivacuatJon^fL ' " 

' i ’76?'- 

/. '''-•P&KSgnem (* /row Engl^*" 


_ 

Evacuation of Sat ^ 1111 




as they have been 
called, founded the 
province of Ontario, 
and contributed many 
thousands to Nova 
Scotia and New 
Brunswick. Their de¬ 
scendants in Canada 
have organized themselves into the 
United Empire Loyalists, the counter¬ 
part in that country of the organiza¬ 
tions of the descendants of the revolu¬ 
tionary patriots in the United States, 
the Sons of the American Revolution 
and the Daughters of the American 
Revolution. 




















176 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


Suggestive Questions 

1. Were the patriots in Massachusetts justified in taking 
up military drill and in gathering military stores? What 
was the effect of the Battle of Concord and Lexington? Why 
was Bunker Hill a poor place for the Americans to make a 
stand? What was the result of this battle in the American 
cause? Why was the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown 
Point important for the Americans? Why did the British 
leave Boston? 

2. Was there any blood shed before the meeting of the 
Second Continental Congress? Was the Declaration of In¬ 
dependence made in sudden excitement after a battle with 
the British? What and when was the important battle pre¬ 
ceding the Declaration? Why did not Washington sign the 
Declaration? Where was he when it was made? Why, ac¬ 
cording to the Declaration, were the Americans justified in 
rising up against the British? Who were the leaders in 
the Congress that passed the Declaration? 

3. Why did the British want to hold New York? During 
the fighting of 1776 and 1777 in and about New York and 
Philadelphia, what qualities of a great general did Washing¬ 
ton exhibit? What battle was fought on Long Island? What 
in New Jersey? 

4. How did Washington, in the vicinity of Philadelphia, 
help the Americans at Saratoga? Do you think Burgoyne 
was a good or a poor leader of an army? Why? What 
effect did the result at Saratoga have on the attitude of 
France toward the United States? If France wanted to 
help the United States, was she justified in waiting till the 
Americans won a battle? Why did the British leave Phila¬ 
delphia? How did Benedict Arnold, who was one of the 
American generals at Saratoga, later almost destroy part of 
the benefits of that victory for the Amercians? 

5. Why did the British send an army to the southern 
states? Was Greene a good or poor general for the Ameri¬ 
cans? What mistake did Cornwallis make in his leadership 
of the British at Yorktown? In what two ways did the 
French help the Americans at Yorktown? Describe the feats 














































THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


177 


of the most prominent leader of the American navy during 
the war. How did George Rogers Clark help the American 
peace commissioners at Paris to get good terms: from the 
British? Who were the loyalists? What kind of people 
usually joined them? 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That it was justifiable to hang Major Andre. 

2. Resolved, That the Americans would not have won their 
Independence without the aid of France. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. The Battles of Concord and Lexington and Bunker Hill. 
Hart, Camps and Firesides of the Revolution, 257; C. C. 
Coffin, Boys of Seventy-Six; Roosevelt and others, Stories of 
the Republic, 23. 

2. Lafayette. Old South Leaflets, I, 7, and IV, 5, 97, 
and 98. 

3. Capture of Boston. Hart, Camps and Firesides of the 
Revolution, 261. 

4. Franklin in France. Morse, Benjamin Franklin, 217— 
299; Halsey, Epochs, III, 142-149; Jusserancl, Our First Alli¬ 
ance, National Geographic Magazine, XXVIII (1917). 

5. The Execution of Andre. Hart, Camps and Firesides 
of the Revolution, 289. 

6. John Paul Jones. Hart, JoJm Paul Jones, in The 
Mentor, No. 117; and Don C. Seitz, Paul Jones, His Exploits 
in English Seas during 1778-1780. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Loyalists. Tyler, American Revolution, I, 293-383; 
Avery, United, States, VI, 333-341. 

2. George Rogers Clark. Thwaite, How George Rogers 
Clark Won the Northwest; Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero 
Tales, 29-43. 

3. The United States Flag. Fow, True Story of the Ameri¬ 
can Flag; Champion, The American Flag, in Journal of 


178 


THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE 


American History, I, 9-18; The Mentor Association, I, No. 
43. 

4. The Declaration of Independence. Avery, History oj 
the United States, V, 370-400; Hart, Source Book, 147-149; 
Friedenwald, Declaration oj Independence; Elson, Sidelights 
on American History, 1-25. 

Important Dates 

1775. Battle of Concord and Lexington. 

1775. Battle of Bunker Hill. 

1775. Meeting of Second Continental Congress. 

1776. Declaration of Independence. 

1777. Surrender at Saratoga. 

1777-1778. Winter at Valley Forge. 

1778. George Rogers Clark conquers the Northwest. 
1781. Surrender at Yorktown. 

1783. Treaty of Peace with England. 

Books to Remember 

1. John Fiske, The American Revolution. 

2. M. C. Tyler, Literary History of the American 
Revolution. 

(From the American point of view.) 


CHAPTER IX 


ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 

THE ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION 

Weakness of the Articles of Confederation. — The 

Articles of Confederation, which Congress had begun 
to consider at the time of the Declaration of Inde¬ 
pendence, but which went into effect only in 1781, did 
not work well after the country settled down to peace 
in 1783. Their weaknesses were many. 

1. There was no single individual at the head of the 
government, like the President of the United States of 
today, to enforce the laws. The Congress that made the 
laws, had no power to enforce them. 

2. Congress was very ineffective as a law-making 
body, because it could not make a law binding on an 
individual citizen. It could only make recommendations 
to the states, which the states might or might not accept. 

3. On the important subject of the regulation of 
commerce with foreign states, Congress had no power at 
all. This was in the hands of the states entirely, some 
of which imposed a high tariff on goods coming into 
their boundaries, some a low tariff, and some none at all. 

4. Congress could not raise money by taxation, but 
was compelled to rely on the states for contributions, 
which the states proved anything but generous and 
prompt in forwarding. 


179 


180 ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 


5. There was no supreme court. 

6. If a state broke a treaty made by Congress with 
a foreign state, Congress had no power to restrain it. 
The result was that most foreign states refused to make 
treaties with the United States. 

7. The Articles could be amended only by the unan¬ 
imous consent of the states, which, in the several at¬ 
tempts that were made, it was impossible to secure. 

The Spirit of Unrest. — The spirit of unrest, which is 
almost sure to break out when government is weak, 
became rampant. In Massachusetts a band of discon¬ 
tented. led by Daniel Shays, defied authority and terror¬ 
ized the country in the central part of the state, near 
Worcester, for several months before they were put 
down. Friends of good government grew discouraged. 
Wrote Washington, “ How melancholy is the reflection 
that in so short a space we have made such long strides 
toward fulfilling the predictions of our transatlantic 
foes. ‘ Leave them to themselves, and their govern¬ 
ment will soon dissolved Will not the wise and the 
good strive hard to avert this evil? . . . Thirteen sov¬ 
ereignties pulling against each other, and all tugging 
at the federal head, will soon bring ruin on the whole.” 

The Ordinance of 1787. — Congress scored one suc¬ 
cess in the midst of the growing contempt for its author¬ 
ity, by passing a wise law for the government of the 
‘ people who would some day pour into the Northwest 
Territory, north of the Ohio. This was the Ordinance 
of 1787. The celebrated law provided (1) that states 
should be formed in this region from time to time and 
admitted into the union; (2) that slavery should be 
forever prohibited there; (3) that religious liberty 
should be guaranteed; (4) that (to quote the law) “ re- 


ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 181 

ligion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good 
government and the happiness of mankind, schools and 
the means of education shall forever be encouraged.” 
This provision for education was generously carried out, 
in the setting aside by congress of the proceeds of the 
sale in every state of lot sixteen in every township, or 
one thirty-sixth of an entire state, for the advancement 
of the common schools, and the proceeds of the sale of 
two whole townships for a state university'. These 
u Northwestern ” regions developed rapidly into progres¬ 
sive and liberal communities. 


THE CONSTITUTION OF 1787 

The Constitutional Convention. —The Congress of 
the Confederation, which had now sunk very low in 
popular esteem, suffered its greatest blow when the peo¬ 
ple rose up and in a popular convention in Philadelphia 
in 1787 made a new government that wiped the congress 
out of existence. The leader of the movement was Alex¬ 
ander Hamilton of New York. This great statesman, 
then only thirty years old, w T as sent by New York as 
one of its representatives in the convention in Philadel¬ 
phia. He proved himself one of the most useful mem¬ 
bers of that body. Washington, without whose support 
the demand for the new government would probably 
have failed, came as a delegate from Virginia, and served 
as chairman of the body. Another important delegate 
from Virginia was James Madison. Benjamin Franklin, 
now eighty-two years old and just returned from 
France, loaded with honors, headed the delegation from 
Pennsylvania; Roger Sherman came from Connecticut; 
Eldridge Gerry from Massachusetts and Patrick Henry 


182 ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 

of Virginia stood aloof from the movement. John Ad¬ 
ams was absent from the country as minister to Great 
Britain, John Jay as minister to Spain, and Thomas 
Jefferson as minister to France. 

The Compromises of the Constitution. — It naturally 
proved difficult, after the fifty-five delegates got down 
to work, to harmonize the many conflicting interests. 
The large states were arrayed against the small states; 
the commercial north against the agricultural south; and 
the aristocrats, who wanted to hold the people down, 
against those who believed in the people and desired 
to place political power in their hands. 

First Compromise. The House of Representatives.— 
The large states were placated by the formation of the 
lower house of Congress, in which each state was to be 
represented according to its population. This arrange¬ 
ment gave to the larger states an advantage over the 
smaller states. 

Second Compromise. The Senate., — The smaller 

states were correspondingly pleased by the creation of 
the upper house of Congress, the present United States 
Senate, which was to consist of two senators from each 
state. It was thought that the smaller states would 
be protected from the larger states, if in this body all 
the states were equally represented. 

Third Compromise. Foreign Commerce. — To the 
great satisfaction of the commercial states of the North 
Congress was clothed with the power to regulate foreign 
commerce, though one small part of foreign commerce, 
the importation of slaves, it was not allowed to touch 
till 1808. This exception was made in the interests of 
the southern slave-holding states. 

Fourth Compromise. Slaves. — Inasmuch as the 


ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 183 


slaves of the South were denied many of the privileges 
of citizenship by the laws of the various states, it was 
agreed, first, that the slaves should not all be counted 
in reckoning the population of the states to serve 
as a basis for the apportionment of direct taxes among 
the members of the Union, and, second, that they should 
not all be counted by Congress, when that body set 
out to fix the number of representatives that each state 
might send to the lower house of Congress. In each of 
these two cases only three-fifths of the slaves were to 
be counted. 

Fifth Compromise. Elections. — The people were 
given power to elect their representatives in the lower 
house of Congress by their own direct vote, but for the 
senators of the upper house of Congress and for Presi¬ 
dent they were to vote only indirectly. In other words, 
the people were to elect the members of the state legis¬ 
latures, who in turn were to elect the senators; and sim¬ 
ilarly the people were to elect the members of the state 
electoral colleges, who then should proceed to elect the 
President. The two bodies in the national government 
which were thus furthest removed from direct control 
by popular vote, that is, the Senate and the President, 
were together to select the Supreme Court. The people 
were thus to have direct control over one-half of the 
legislative branch, and indirect control over the other 
half of this branch and over the executive and judicial 
branches of the government. 

Contrast between the Articles of Confederation and 
the Constitution. — The contrast between the old and 
new forms of government may be made as follows: 

(1) A single individual would now administer the 
executive branch of the national government. 


184 ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 


(2) The Congress was to consist of two houses in¬ 
stead of one. 

(3) There was to be a federal tribunal, the Supreme 
Court, the decisions of which would be uniform in all 
the states, whereas there had been no such permanent 
body up to 1787. 

(4) The new plan could be changed by a two-thirds 
vote in Congress or by the action of a national conven¬ 
tion, with the expressed approval, in either case, of three- 
fourths of the states. Under this method of change 
there have now been nineteen amendments to the Con¬ 
stitution, whereas the people failed to put through a 
single amendment to the Articles of Confederation. 
Amendments to a scheme of government for a great 
nation slowly become necessary as times change. There¬ 
fore wisely the Constitution provided an easier method 
of amendment than had existed formerly. 

The Powers of Congress. — The new Congress that 
was to make laws, which should be not merely “ recom¬ 
mendations ” to the states but binding obligations on all 
citizens, could legislate on eighteen different subjects. 
These included six important powers. 

(1) Power to force individual citizens to pay taxes, 
and not merely to ask gifts from the states: This was 
granted in order that the national government might 
have a fund out of which to pay its own expenses; 

(2) To borrow money, a very essential power in the 
time of a great crisis, such as war; 

(3) To raise and support armies, and no longer to 
beg soldiers from the states; 

(4) To make tariff laws, and in general to control 
the commercial relations of the nation, beyond the power 
of the states to interfere; 


ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 185 

(5) To establish post offices and post roads, which 
should constitute one uniform system in all the states; 

(6) To make all laws which should be necessary and 
proper to carry out its other powers. This vague power 
was greatly stretched to meet all sorts of emergencies, 
as time went on. 

The States. — Certain specified powers were by the 
Constitution forbidden to the states, but aside from 
these and the powers granted by the states to the fed¬ 
eral government, the states were to be sovereign, that 
is, they were to be free to pass any legislation they 
chose. As a matter of fact, most of the laws that govern 
people now in the ordinary affairs of life, are made by 
the states and not by the nation. 

The Success of the Constitution. — Framed in this 
way and endowed with these powers, the government of 
the United States under the Constitution was able to 
win the respect of all both at home and abroad. Its 
best recommendation is the fact that it has continued 
down to the present time with only nineteen minor 
changes. 

Adoption of the Constitution. — The convention in 
Philadelphia, which had gone ahead planning the death 
of the old Congress, did not ask that body to vote on 
the completed document. Rather it requested it to refer 
the matter to conventions of the people in the states 
for final consideration. It was provided that when nine 
of the thirteen states had ratified the Constitution, it 
should go into operation. Small states, like Delaware 
and New Jersey, accepted it at once and unanimously; 
the larger states, like Virginia and Massachusetts, only 
after bitter debates and close votes. The vote in the 
convention in Virginia was 89 to 79, and in New York, 


186 ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 


where the vote of two men swung the convention, the 
result was even closer. Here Alexander Hamilton, who 
had really started the movement for the new govern¬ 
ment, John Jay, and James Madison, contributed to the 
successful result by numerous articles in the newspapers, 
which have since been collected and published as the 
Federalist. Washington, the presiding officer of the 
convention and the most influential personage in the 
country, was most urgent in exhorting his fellow citizens 
to accept the new plan. Two alone of the thirteen states, 
Rhode Island, which had sent no delegates to Phila¬ 
delphia, and North Carolina, were not members of the 
United States of America, when the Constitution went 
into effect in 1789, but after a year they too came in. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. What were the leading weaknesses of the Articles of 
Confederation? Why did the spirit of unrest break out? 
Why is the Ordinance of 1787 looked upon as a great law? 
What did it do for education? 

2. Why was it easy to get the states to send delegates to 
the Constitutional Convention? Who were the leaders of the 
convention? What were the leading compromises of the 
Constitution? In what important respects did the new Con¬ 
stitution differ from the Articles of Confederation? What were 
the leading powers of the new Congress? Why were the small 
states eager for the new Constitution, and the larger states 
not so eager? Why did not John Adams, John Jay, and 
Thomas Jefferson take part in the Constitutional Convention? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the Constitutional Convention was un¬ 
just in its treatment of the Congress of the Confederation. 


ADOPTING THE FRAME OF GOVERNMENT 187 


Topics for Compositions 

1. Write a speech that Washington might have made to 
the Convention in favor of the new government, based on 
the experiences of the country under the Articles of Con¬ 
federation. 

2. Write a speech against the Constitution. Hart, Con¬ 
temporaries, III, 251-254. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation. Farrand, 
Framing of the Constitution. 

2. Adoption of the Constitution. Fiske, Critical Period, 
306-350; Averv, United States, VII, 1—IS; Harding, Orations } 

47-121. 

Important Dates 

1788. Constitutional Convention. 

1789. Constitution goes into effect. 

Books to Remember 

1. John Fiske, Critical Period. 

2. J. B. McMaster, United States. 


t 


CHAPTER X 


IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF THE 
CONSTITUTION 

STARTING THE NEW GOVERNMENT 

George Washington. First President. — In 1789 

George Washington entered upon the fourth and last 
phase of his illustrious career. As loyal subject of Great 
Britain he had rendered signal services to the Mother 
Country in the opening crisis of the French and Indian 
War. As commander-in-chief of the forces of the re¬ 
volting colonies in the struggle for freedom, by his 
patience, persistence, and skill, he had established the 
independence of the colonies; and as the most distin¬ 
guished citizen of the new nation he had taken a lead¬ 
ing part in pointing out to his fellow countrymen the 
defects of the Articles of Confederation. Great in colo¬ 
nial affairs, in the military annals of the new republic, 
and in peaceful private life, he now became the Presi¬ 
dent of the thirteen states which had united, and added 
still more luster to his name. His election w r as 

t 

unanimous. 

The First Tariff Law. — Almost the first thing done 

by the new Congress was to proceed to raise revenue to 
pay the expenses of the national government. On the 
4th of July of the first year of its existence, it exercised 
its right under the Constitution “ to lay and collect taxes, 

188 


IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 189 


duties, imposts, and excises,” by passing, as one of its 
first measures, a tariff law, called “ An act for the en¬ 
couragement and production of Manufactures.” In colo¬ 
nial times the Americans had been opposed to such a 
tax, whether it was a tax on molasses, sugar, or tea. 



Washington 

From the statue by H. K. Brown, Union Square, New York. 





190 IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 



New Iork’s Second City Hall, Federal Hall 


. Erected 1700, at Wall and Nassau Streets. Here George Wash¬ 
ington was inaugurated first president of the United States 
April 30, 1789, and here the Congress of the United States met 
till the removal of the national capital to Philadelphia. 


When the Parliament of Great Britain had tried to force 
them to pay it at their custom houses, they refused, 
but now they paid similar exactions without question. 
























































































































































































IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 191 


Taxation with representation was an immediate and 
huge success. The objects of the tax were quite the 
same as those of every other tariff tax in the country’s 
history, first, to raise revenue; and, second, by imposing 
the tax on goods coming into the country, to render it 
difficult for foreigners to send in their manufactured goods 
to compete with American-made goods in the American 
market. In this latter sense the law was a protection 
to American manufacturers, and is known as a protec¬ 
tive tariff. It was hoped that with such protection man¬ 
ufacturing in America, which England had prohibited, 
might grow rapidly. The revenues from the new tariff 
and that which came in from an excise tax on the manu¬ 
facture of distilled spirits and from the sale of public 
lands in the west, was devoted in large part to paying 
off the part of the national debt due in France and 
Holland. 

The Whiskey Rebellion. — The excise tax on the man¬ 
ufacture of distilled spirits was very unpopular in the 
western part of Pennsylvania, where the difficulties of 
shipping farm products over the mountains to the sea¬ 
board made it more profitable for the farmer to convert 
his bulky corn into whiskey before shipment. The 
opposition took the form of a rebellion against the law. 
President Washington called out the militia of three 
states, fifteen thousand strong, and sent them against the 
farmer-distillers. The rebellion, which was manifested 
chiefly in tarring and feathering the tax collectors and 
refusing to pay the tax, collapsed utterly. It was a 
good thing for the prestige of the new central govern¬ 
ment of the United States that the President was able 
to demonstrate to the people that his government could 
put an effective military force promptly into the field. 


192 IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 


Pittsburgh, the center of the rebellion, had been 
founded as a French post, and had remained French 
for four years under the name of Fort Duquesne. It 
had then passed to the English at their capture of the 
region in 1758. By 1794, the year of the rebellion, the 
town was quite important, on account of the heavy 
migration that passed through it on the way down the 
Ohio to the west. 

Funding the Debt. — The part of the national debt, 
which was payable to American citizens, was in the 
form of certificates of indebtedness, issued by the Con¬ 
gress of the Confederation during the War of the Revo¬ 
lution and payable to the holders, but there was no gold 
back of them in the treasury of the government to secure 
their payment. People at first accepted the certificates 
as money because they trusted the government which 
promised to pay the sums called for, but when the repu¬ 
tation of the government began to sink and all but dis¬ 
appeared, people would hardly accept the certificates at 
all. Speculators bought them up for a few cents on 
the dollar, taking their chances that the government 
might some day be able and willing to pay them. To 
make these certificates good, Congress agreed to issue 
a fund of new bonds, that is, new promises for the old 
promises, placing gold in the treasury to meet the obli¬ 
gation. It then requested the people to exchange the 
old for the new. 

Assumption of the State Debts. — Congress gener¬ 
ously assumed the debts which the separate states had 
incurred for the common cause during the Revolution, 
and agreed to pay them. This was shrewd policy for 
the new government, first, because it was a great relief 
to the states, and second, because it pleased those indi- 


IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 193 


viduals who had lent money to the states and believed 
that the promise to pay of the United States was worth 
more than the promises of the states. All holders of 
the state debts were thus converted into loyal supporters 
of the United States, to which government they must 
now look for payment. In order to gain more votes for 
the congressional assumption of the state obligations, 
Alexander Hamilton, a Northerner, who was Washing¬ 
ton’s Secretary of the Treasury, made a bargain with 
Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, who was Secretary of 
State in Washington’s cabinet, by which Jefferson prom¬ 
ised to get a sufficient number of his friends in Congress 
to vote for the scheme and thus pass it, in return for 
Hamilton’s promise that he would have a certain number 
of his northern friends in Congress vote with the South¬ 
erners to locate the national capital on the Potomac. 
The “bargain” went through; Congress paid the state 
debts; and the capital went to the present District of 
Columbia, which was created out of Maryland lands on 
the Potomac. 

The National Bank. — Congress further aided the 
business interests of the country by - setting up a na¬ 
tional bank, the first Bank of the United States. The 

bank not onlv had the name of the United States at- 
%/ 

tached to it, but it could point to the fact that the 
government of the United States itself held stock in it, 
and had deposited the public funds in its vaults. More¬ 
over, the bank could do business in every state alike, 
and its notes circulated everywhere without fluctuation 
of value. With all these advantages in its favor, the 
new Bank of the United States was a success from the 
beginning. Private individuals, as well as the United 
States, placed their deposits in it, and its paper notes 


194 IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 

circulated as money in all the states at their full value. 

Alexander Hamilton. — The young Secretary of the 
Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, who was only thirty- 
two years of age when he accepted Washington’s invita¬ 
tion to become the head of the United States treasury, 
was an immigrant from the British island of Nevis in 
the West Indies, a graduate of King’s College, now 



Alexander Hamilton 

After an engraving by J. Rogers from the Talleju’and Miniature. 

Columbia University, in the city of New York, a sol¬ 
dier and an aide of Washington during the Revolution 
and a leading spirit in the movement in favor of thc- 
new government under the Constitution. He advocated 
the new tariff law, the funding system, assumption of 
the state debts, and the national bank with such power¬ 
ful logic that he convinced not only President Washing¬ 
ton and the members of Congress, of the wisdom of the 
measures, but also most authorities from that day to 
this. He has the reputation of having been one of the 
nation’s most constructive statesmen. 






IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 195 


Ten Amendments to the Constitution. — Congress 
passed by a two-thirds vote in each house, and three- 
fourths of the states approved, a “ bill of rights,” which 
became the first ten amendments of the Constitution. 
The new safeguards gave the friends of freedom and 
progress increased assurance that personal rights would 
be respected in the United States. By them Congress 
was forbidden to interfere with religious freedom, free¬ 
dom of speech and of the press, and the right to assem¬ 
ble and petition the government ; while the right of trial 
by jury and certain other rights pertaining to the con¬ 
duct of judicial proceedings were made more definite. 

The First Political Parties. — When the people were 
debating in the state conventions whether or not to ac¬ 
cept the Constitution, those who favored the step were 
called Federalists, because they were advocating a fed¬ 
eral form of government, while the opponents of the step 
were appropriately called Anti-Federalists. After the 
Constitution went into effect, those who, with Secretary 
Hamilton, wanted a strong central government, retained 
the name of Federalists. Secretary Jefferson’s friends 
on the other hand, opposed the building up of a strong 
national government and preferred to strengthen the 
states. The latter took the name of Democratic-Repub¬ 
licans. In general the leaders of the commercial and 
business interests were Federalists, the farmers Demo¬ 
cratic-Republicans. Into the former party went the 
aristocratic and conservative classes, who were well satis¬ 
fied with the state suffrage laws, which held the masses 
down and allowed scarcely one man in five to vote. 
Jefferson and his followers wished to let every man vote. 
They would show no favors “ to the rich, the well born, 
and the able,” but sought the rights of the masses. 




Mrs. Washington’s First Reception 











IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 197 

* 

Washington’s Farewell Address. — At the end of his 

second term of office President Washington addressed 
some very wise words to his fellow citizens in a farewell 
address. He begged the people to cherish the union 
of the states, to guard against too much partisanship in 
their politics, “ to observe good faith and justice with 
all nations,” “ to cultivate peace and harmony with all,” 
but “ to steer clear of permanent alliances with any por¬ 
tion of the foreign world.” This ideal of keeping out 
of the quarrels of Europe was rigidly adhered to in the 
next century, and was of great benefit to the United 
States during its infancy while its chief object was the 
development of its own vast resources. 

Three Unwise Laws. — President Washington served 
two terms and then in the country’s first partisan elec¬ 
tion John Adams, a Federalist, was chosen President. 
His Vice-President, Thomas Jefferson, was of the op¬ 
posing party, for at that time the candidate receiving 
the largest number of votes in the electoral colleges be¬ 
came President and the one receiving the next largest 
number was made Vice-President. John Adams had 
been a patriotic supporter of the Revolution in Massa¬ 
chusetts, one of the negotiators of the treaty of peace 
with England at Paris in 1783, minister to Great Britain, 
and Vice-President under Washington. 

Under him three unwise laws were passed. One, the 
Naturalization Act, made it harder for a foreigner to be¬ 
come a citizen of the United States, by lengthening from 
five to fourteen years the preliminary period of residence 
in the country required of applicants for citizenship; 
the second, the Alien Act, authorized the President to 
send aliens out of the country, if he considered them 
undesirable; and a third, the Sedition Act, punished 


198 IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 


“ scandalous and malicious writing ” against the govern¬ 
ment. The acts were contrary to the traditional welcome 
which America had always extended to foreigners, and 
contrary to the spirit of freedom which was the birth¬ 
right of Americans. They did more harm than good. 

The Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions. — Vice- 
President Jefferson, leader of the Democratic-Republi¬ 
cans, was so incensed at the laws that he wrote a series 
of resolutions against them, which the legislature of the 
state of Kentucky adopted by a formal vote. In these 
“ Kentucky Resolutions ” Jefferson denounced the Alien 
and Sedition Laws as unconstitutional. He announced 
the doctrine of states’ rights, namely, that the Constitu¬ 
tion was only a compact or contract between the states, 
that the United States was only the agent of the states, 
and that the states could decide when Congress had gone 
beyond its powers and had broken the agreement of the 
Constitution. The famous resolutions even went so far as 
to declare that when the states decided that the national 
Congress had gone beyond its powers, the states could 
“ nullify,” that is, declare void, the national legislation 
in question. This was a dangerous doctrine, if the states 
were to live together in peace under the Constitution. 
Similar resolutions, though not so extreme, were passed 
by the legislature of Virginia. The opponents of the 
new doctrine of states’ rights believed that the Supreme 
Court should decide all disputes between the national 
government and the states. 

Thomas Jefferson. — In 1801 the Federalist party, 
which had stood behind Washington and Adams, went 
out of office, and Thomas Jefferson, leader of the op¬ 
posing party, the Democrat-Republicans, became Pres¬ 
ident. Jefferson's previous public service had been long 


IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 199 

and distinguished, for he had been a member of the 
House of Burgesses in Virginia, author of the Declaration 
of Independence, upholder of the Revolution in the Con¬ 
tinental Congress, Governor of Virginia, minister to 
France, Washington’s Secretary of State, a great politi- 



Thomas Jefferson 


cal leader of the people, and the founder of the Demo¬ 
cratic-Republican party. 

The Disputed Election. — When the electoral vote was 
counted it was found that Jefferson and Aaron Burr, 
both Democratic-Republicans, were tied for the first 
place. The electors had written two names on a single 






200 IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 


slip of paper, without indicating which name was for 
the presidency and which for the vice-presidency. Ac¬ 
cording to the Constitution, the one receiving the high¬ 
est vote was to be President and the next highest Vice- 
President. A tie vote had not been anticipated. Under 
the Constitution the decision as to who should be the 
President in such a case was thrown into the House of 
Representatives, which awarded the prize to Jefferson. 
To prevent this difficulty in the future the twelfth 
amendment to the Constitution was passed, directing the 
electors to vote on a separate slip of paper for President 
and to complete the choice of this official before proceed¬ 
ing to vote for Vice-President. In this way the present 
situation has come about that President and Vice- 
President cannot be men of different parties, as in the 
case of Adams and Jefferson, for the electors of the ma¬ 
jority party will elect first their candidate for President 
and then their candidate for Vice-President. 

Immediate Changes. — As champions of democracy 
against the more aristocratic leanings of the defeated 
Federalists, the leaders of the new party in power made 
some immediate changes in the laws of the land. The 
Alien and Sedition Laws, which had expired, were not 
renewed, and the Naturalization Law was amended so 
that foreigners could become citizens after five years’ 
residence in the land. Taxes were lowered, the size of 
the navy reduced, and no new warships built. Despite 
their professions, however, Jefferson and his followers 
did not do away with all the financial measures which 
Secretary Hamilton had induced the Federalists under 
Washington to enact into law, and which had proved 
valuable to the nation, 


IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 201 


Suggestive Questions 

1. Give a brief outline of Washington’s career down to 
1789. What is a tariff law? Why did the first Congress of 
the United States pass one almost immediately? What was 
the whiskey rebellion and where did it occur? Was it suc¬ 
cessful? Why was it wise for Congress to pay off the debts 
of the states? Why do we look upon Alexander Hamilton as 
a great man? How is the Constitution amended? How 
many amendments were passed while Washington was Presi¬ 
dent? What did Washington think about political parties and 
about the United States taking part in the affairs of other 
nations? For what three laws is the presidency of John 
Adams remembered? 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That George Washington did not add any¬ 
thing to his reputation by being President. 

2. Resolved, That Washington gave wise advice in his 
Farewell Address, when he advised the United States “ to 
steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the 
foreign world.” 

3. Resolved, That Washington was wise in refusing a third 
term. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Write an essay on why the people were glad to have 
Washington as President. 

2. The city of Washington in Washington’s time. P. E. 
Phillips, Beginnings of Washington. 

3. Social Customs in Washington’s time. Hart, Source 
Book, 181-183; Halsey, Epochs, IV, 62-64; Bassett, Federal¬ 
ist System, 150-162; Sparks, The Men Who Made the Nation, 
181-218. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Minister Genet from France. Avery, United States, 
VII, 78-91; Hart, Contemporaries , 307-311. 

2. The Whiskey Rebellion. Avery, United States, VII, 
141-155. 


202 IMMEDIATE SUCCESS OF CONSTITUTION 


Important Dates 

1789. Washington inaugurated first President. 
1801. Jefferson becomes President. 

Books to Remember 

1. Henry Cabot Lodge, George Washington . 

2. P. L. Ford, George Washington. 


CHAPTER XI 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS 1789-1815 

UNDER WASHINGTON AND ADAMS 

War in Europe. — Just as Washington was entering 
upon his second term of office war broke out in Europe 
between France and England, and raged with slight 
intermissions until 1815. Each side was aided by other 
European powers. From the year 1689, America, as a 
part of the British Empire, had been drawn into Franco- 
British struggles almost as a matter of course. It now 
seemed as if it were going to prove impossible to stand 
aloof from this new conflict, the most fearful of all. 
Washington’s parting advice to “ steer clear of perma¬ 
nent alliances with any portion of the foreign world ” was 
for a time strictly adhered to. But after patiently en¬ 
during grievous insults on the sea, the nation was at 
last forced to take stern measures to defend itself. 

American Food Products. — Each side in the Eu¬ 
ropean struggle tried to prevent American wheat, flour, 
and meat products, from reaching the other. The trade 
in these products, however, was extremely profitable 
to all concerned, so that the merchants of America in¬ 
sisted on taking risks, defied the blockade in Europe, 
and carried their goods to both England and France. 
The belligerent nations, each to prevent food from reach¬ 
ing the other, captured American food ships by the hun- 

203 


204 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 


dred. Still the traffic went on. A large portion of 
the American people, grateful for what France had done 
at Yorktown, desired to help her openly against Eng¬ 
land. In fact, the treaty of alliance with France after 
the surrender of Burgoyne at Saratoga in 1778, seemed 
to bind the United States in honor to take this step, 
whenever France was engaged in a defensive war; if 
France was engaged in an offensive war, a con¬ 
tingency for which the treaty made no provision, 
the implication seemed to be that the United States 
was not bound to give assistance. President Washing¬ 
ton, after careful consideration, refused help to France 
on the ground that her war with England was not a 
defensive war. 

Neutrality. — Washington’s policy was neutrality, 
which meant that this country would not assist either 
side in the war. The President feared that if the United 
States entered the struggle on one side or the other, 
peaceful development in this country would cease, and 
in the commotion the new government might go to 
pieces. 

The Jay Treaty. — Not only did President Washing¬ 
ton fail to do the bidding of France against England; he 
even made a friendly treaty with the latter power, which 
temporarily patched up the differences between the two 
countries. John Jay, who had been one of the negoti¬ 
ators of the treaty of peace with England in 1783 and 
under President Washington the Chief Justice of the 
United States, negotiated the new treaty, which is now 
known by his name. England agreed in the treaty 
to withdraw her troops from the “ Northwest Terri¬ 
tory,” which she had refused to do since 1783, in defiance 
of the plain provisions of the treaty of peace; but she 



205 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 

refused to renounce any of her unjust practices against 
the American ships seeking to reach the ports of France. 
For damages to American shipping resulting from these 
practices England later paid $10,000,000 to the 
United States. 

French Retaliation. — In retaliation for this friendly 
treaty with her enemy, France treated American ships 
more harshly than ever. She insulted the national 
dignity by offering, through her ministers, to bribe cer¬ 
tain envoys whom the United States sent to her to settle 
the differences between the two countries. Things went 
from bad to worse, until finally French and American 
ships began to fire on one another in the waters of the 
West Indies. Several hostile encounters took place, blood 
was shed, men were killed, and ships and prisoners of 
war were taken on both sides. Here the unfortunate 
affair ended, for President Adams made a new treaty 
with France, and peaceful relations were resumed. 


UNDER JEFFERSON 

The Grievances in Detail. — The war in Europe was 
still going on when Jefferson came to the presidency, 
and the grievances suffered by the Americans on the 
sea continued. America was imposed upon by both 
sides, as a weak nation that could not defend herself. 
The grievances which she suffered at this time may be 
summed up as follows: 

First Grievance. Impressment. — The forced im¬ 
pressment of her citizens into the naval service of the 
British war ships was her chief grievance. An English 
man-of-war, meeting with an American commercial ship 
on the sea, would stop her, send on a boarding crew, line 


206 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 


up the American sailors on deck, pick out several on the 
claim that they were British subjects, and carry them off 
to forced service on the British war ship. Thousands of 
Americans were thus seized. If the United States had 
still belonged to England, it would have been legitimate 
for His Majesty’s naval officers to behave thus, since 
they were in the habit of impressing seamen from private 
British ships in this same way and for the same purpose; 
but since the United States was now a free and inde¬ 
pendent nation, English officers had no right to do these 
things on American ships. It was a towering insult. 
Although France followed the same practice to some 
extent, her offenses along this line were not to be com¬ 
pared with those of Great Britain. 

Second Grievance. The Blockades in Europe. — 
England declared those ports of the coast of Europe, 
which were under.the control of France, under a block¬ 
ade, and announced that no ships of peaceful nations 
would be permitted to go to the prohibited ports with¬ 
out first getting England’s permission. Ships trying to 
break the blockade and carry goods to France in spite 
of it, would be subject to capture by the British ships 
of war. Inasmuch as France claimed almost the en¬ 
tire coast of Europe at this time, the result was that 
practically the whole of Europe was closed to American 
ships. France retaliated by the Berlin and Milan De¬ 
crees, declaring the British islands under a similar block¬ 
ade and imposing similar penalties on ships for 
disobedience. Neither side of course had the requisite 
number of vessels to guard the prohibited coasts, and 
in this position of affairs Americans rightly took the 
position that the blockade existed on paper only and 
need not by the rules of war be regarded. 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 


207 


Third Grievance. The Doctrine of Contraband. — 

The European nations claimed that their vessels- of war 
might stop peaceful commercial vessels on the sea, and if 
they found on them certain forbidden goods destined to 
enemy ports and useful in the prosecution of war, might 
capture these and sometimes even take the ships into cus¬ 
tody. Nations were quite in agreement in support of the 
general practice, but just what should be included in the 
list of forbidden goods, called contraband of war, was 
often in dispute. Some said that military supplies only 
should be counted, while others contended that food 
also must be included, on the ground that such ma¬ 
terial helped to support a nation at war. Both England 
and France took millions of 'dollars’ worth of American 
goods as contraband, including foodstuffs. 

President Jefferson as a Man of Peace. — Like Presi¬ 
dents Washington and Adams before him, President 
Jefferson was a man of peace. He preferred that his 
country should suffer almost anything rather than go 
to war. He followed Washington in believing that the 
United States should avoid, to use Jefferson’s own phrase, 
“ entangling alliances ” w r ith either side in Europe. He 
was for peace at any price. 

The Embargo Act. — First the peace-loving Presi¬ 
dent induced Congress to put into operation the old 
pre-revolutionary weapon of non-importation. This 
failed, and an attempt to make a new treaty, to sup¬ 
plement the Jay treaty, also failed. Then at the request 
of the President, Congress passed the Embargo Act, 
under which no vessels could leave the United States 
except with the President’s permission. Again the 
weapon of peace accomplished nothing, for England and 
France did not suffer so grievously for the want of 


208 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 


American goods as did the United States from the 
disastrous effects of the law upon herself. Her sailors 
were thrown out of work by the thousand, and her 
shipowners were brought to the brink of ruin by the 
stopping of trade. Sailors, ship-owners, and exporters, 
especially in New England, clamored for the ships to 
sail to Europe as usual, in the hope that a few might 
escape the warships and get through, and reap the 
enormous profits that were possible. Finally, just be¬ 
fore Jefferson went out of office, Congress yielded to 
the popular demand and repealed the hated law, sub¬ 
stituting for it the Non-Intercourse Act, which shut 
off trade with England and France, but allowed it 
with the other countries. Jefferson left office somewhat 
unpopular because of the failure of all his measures 
to bring England and France to terms. 


UNDER MADISON. WAR WITH ENGLAND 

James Madison.—Like Jefferson, Madison took up 
the presidency after long preliminary training. His 
Notes of the debates in the Constitutional Convention 
of 1787 are one of the most valuable commentaries on 
that instrument, and stamp him as one of the most 
influential, certainly the most useful member, of the 
Constitutional Convention. He helped Hamilton write 
the papers of the Federalist , served as a member of the 
House of Representatives from Virginia during Wash¬ 
ington’s two administrations, and w T as President Jeffer¬ 
son’s Secretary of State. .He was, perhaps, the most 
intellectual of the early American Presidents. 

Declaration of War against England. — Although 
President Madison w r as a man of peace like Washing- 


209 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 

ton, Adams, and Jefferson before him, so many indig¬ 
nities had been shown American citizens on the high 
seas that the honor of the country had become involved. 
The President was, therefore, driven by Congress to 
consent to a war against England. The same grievances 
had been suffered from France also, but the offenses of 



James Madison 


England had been more numerous. Moreover the tra¬ 
ditional hatred of England, resulting from the Revo¬ 
lutionary War, was still strong; and England still held 
Canada, which possibly the Americans might conquer. 
Therefore, if America must fight, the choice of England 
rather than of France as the national enemy was natural. 

The War on the Sea. — The Americans made their 
most brilliant exploits on the water. 

1. The Constitution. — In the first year of the war a 
glorious beginning was made by a series of four vie- 








210 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 


tories, the most notable of which was that of the Con¬ 
stitution over the Guerriere, off the Gulf of St. Law¬ 
rence. Seventy-nine British were lost in the encounter 
and their ship completely destroyed, while the Ameri¬ 
cans lost in killed and wounded only fourteen. Al¬ 
though the British navy at this time numbered over 
1,000 ships and the Americans could muster only 17, 
nevertheless this victory destroyed the American fear 
of the invincibility of the British navy. 



Battle Flag of the Squadron Under Perry, 1813 


2. Commodore Perry. — In the second year, off the 
island of Put-in-Bav, in the western end of Lake Erie, 
near Sandusky, Ohio, Commodore Perry met the enemy 
and electrified the nation by the laconic despatch, “ We 
have met the enemy and they are ours; two ships, two 
brigs, one schooner, and one sloop.” The control of 
Lake Erie now went definitely to the Americans. 


























FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 211 

3. Plattsburg. — In the third year, a British fleet 
was worsted in the harbor of Plattsburg on Lake Cham- 



Operations Around Niagara Falls 


















212 FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 

plain by an American fleet under Captain Macdonough, 
who was then only thirty years of age. 

4. The Blockade. — While the internal seas, like 
Lake Erie and Lake Champlain, were won by the Ameri¬ 
cans, the control of the ocean remained in the hands 
of the enemy throughout the war. The few victories, 
like that of the Constitution over the Guerriere, availed 
little against the overpowering numbers of the British 
ships, which blockaded the Atlantic coast of the United 
States much more effectively than they did the con¬ 
tinent of Europe in the long war that England was 
still waging against France. One station of the block¬ 
ading squadrons in American waters was in Chesa¬ 
peake Bay, one off Sandy Hook near New York, one 
at the eastern end of Long Island, and one at the island 
of Nantucket. From these bases the British controlled 
the coast very thoroughly. 

The War on Land. — On the land the Americans made 
little progress except at the very end of the war. 

1. Niagara Falls .—Around Niagara Falls American 
forces crossed the Niagara River at four points, twice 
in the first year, at Lewiston and at Black Rock, once 
in the second year at Fort Niagara, and once 
in the third year, at Buffalo. The first of: these in¬ 
vading forces was captured, while the other three re¬ 
treated back to the states after remaining but a short 
time on, enemy soil. The fourth, in 1814, succeeded 
in defeating the British and Canadians on the Chippewa 
Creek and at Lundy’s Lane just north of Niagara Falls, 
and then suddenly retired, although they outnumbered 
their opponents two to one. 

2. Detroit. — There was another and equally inglori¬ 
ous invasion of Canada under General Hull in July, 1813. 


» 


213 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 

The Americans had a hard march north through the 
wilderness of Ohio, following in the general track of 
Harmar, St. Clair, and Wayne, who had advanced 
against the Indians of these regions during Washington’s 
presidency. After great exertions they came to Detroit. 
From here they ventured across the river into Canada, 
and then retreated back to the American post without 



0 100 20C 300 

Operations Along the Canadian Border 


even attacking the British on the Canadian side. Then 
Hull suddenly surrendered Detroit to the enemy, who 
followed him into his own country. Hull was con¬ 
demned to die on the charge of cowardice, but was later 
pardoned by the President. After Perry’s victory at 
Put-in-Bay the British themselves got out of Detroit 
and left for home just as suddenly as Hull had left 
the city to them some weeks previously. 
















214 FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 

3. Lake Champlain. — The British invading force 
supporting the fleet which Captain Macdonough stopped 
at Plattsburg in 1814 was easily turned back near Lake 
Champlain. 

4. Washington. — The Atlantic coast was fallen upon 
by the British in two places in the last year of the war. 
First, in the eastern part of Maine, where the town of • 
Castine and a small belt of the surrounding territory 
were occupied. Second, on Chesapeake Bay, where the 



Operations Around Washington 

city of Washington was taken, and the Capitol, the 
White House, and other public buildings burned. Presi¬ 
dent Madison and his cabinet had to flee to escape cap¬ 
ture, while the wit of Mrs. Madison alone saved such 
priceless treasures as the original copy of the Declara¬ 
tion of Independence and Stuart’s portrait of Washing¬ 
ton. Then the enemy moved north to Baltimore, but 
retired before taking the city. 











































215 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 17S9-1S15 

5. New Orleans. — At New Orleans the Americans 
under Andrew Jackson repulsed the invaders, and won 
a great victory. The enemy came up through the 
swamps south of the city and got to within seven miles 
of their goal, but stopped for reinforcements. During 
this delay the Americans under Andrew Jackson, who 
had been taken by surprise, had time to throw up a 
long bulwark of cotton bales for defense. The British 
moved to the attack 1,200 strong on the western or 
southern side of the Mississippi and 5,300 on the eastern 
or northern bank of the river, against Jackson’s en¬ 
trenchments, which lay five miles east of the city in 
the narrow cultivated strip of sugar plantations along 
the river. So close was the swamp to the river on the 
eastern or northern bank that the attacking British 
had to advance over a level lane only 1,000 yards wide. 
Even narrower was the available space for attack on 
the other side. All flank attacks were impossible. 
Major General Pakenham, the British chief of com¬ 
mand, was killed only a few yards from the American 
line. In all, on both sides of the river, the enemy lost 
2,036 men, or between one-third and one-fourth of his 
entire force, and the Americans 71 out of a fighting- 
force of about 5,000. After the battle the British re¬ 
treated to their ships. 

The great victory consoled the Americans for the 
generally poor showing of their land forces at other 
points during the war, and it was the foundation of the 
great popularity which General Jackson later enjoyed. 

The Treaty of Peace. — By the time of this terrible 
battle which was fought on the 8th of January, 1815, rep¬ 
resentatives of the two nations had already concluded a 
treaty of peace at Ghent in Europe. Had the cable then 


216 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 



adjacent country 


NEW 


Cypress Swamp 
aipce Swamp ; * 


OKLEMS and 


The Battle of New Orleans 























217 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 

carried messages under the ocean, the engagement would 
never have taken place, but the contending sides at 
New Orleans knew nothing of the peace. The Senate of 
the United States promptly ratified the treaty. Neither 
side gained territory at the expense of the other, and 
neither paid indemnity to the other; the British did 
not formally renounce the right of impressment, and 
they did not admit error in their treatment of American 
commerce on the sea. Peace, however, the only thing 
gained by the treaty, was welcomed by all. By her 
“ second war of independence,” America at last shook 
herself free from the toils of European wars and poli¬ 
tics, from which she had suffered since 1689. She was 
not to be involved again in the quarrels of Europe for 
another century. 

The long war which had raged in Europe since 1793, 
also ended in 1815, with the defeat of the French under 
Napoleon at Waterloo. France had lost. Indeed she 
had lost in all her trials of strength with England since 

1689. 

Disarmament on the Great Lakes. — After the formal 
treaty of peace with England, the practical statesmen 
of the two countries made another treaty covering the 
relations between Canada and the United States, which 
redounds greatly to the credit of the two nations. It 
was agreed that both England and the United States 
would dismantle their fleets of war vessels on the Great 
Lakes and on Lake Champlain. This included the 
victorious ships of Perry and Macdonough. Each was 
to maintain on these lakes only one small warship, and 
build none there in the future. Forts in lake cities also 
came under the prohibition, and this is why there are 
today no forts at Ticonderoga and Crown Point and 


218 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 


along the shores of the Great Lakes. The simple agree¬ 
ment has kept the peace along the northern border for 
more than a century, and is an example to the nations 
of the world of what may be accomplished by agreements 
to limit military armament. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. Why was war in Europe a serious thing for the United 
States? Why did some in the United States want to favor 
France in the struggle? What made some favor England? 
Why did Washington want to keep out of the war entirely? 
What was his policy? What was the Jay Treaty? Why was 
France angry with the United States over this treaty? 

2. Describe impressment, paper blockade, and contraband. 
Would the European nations have forced the United States 
to undergo these insults, if this country had had a strong 
navy? What can you say in favor of the desire of Presidents 
Washington, Adams, and Jefferson not to let the country 
get into war? What was the embargo? Who made it, the 
President or Congress? Was the embargo the equivalent of 
war? Jefferson expected that the embargo would hurt Eng¬ 
land and France in what ways? 

3. Who first declared the war of 1812, England or the 
United States? Why? Why did the United States have so few 
victories on the sea? Why do you think she was so weak on 
land? Why was it important to hold Lake Champlain and 
the Great Lakes? Did it do the British any good to burn 
the public buildings in Washington? Why was New Orleans 
an important point? What advantage would the possession 
of this point be to the British? Describe the battle ground 
at New Orleans. Why was the British loss so heavy? What 
was peculiar about the treaty of peace? How do you explain 
the fact that the United States has enjoyed over one hun¬ 
dred years of peace along its northern border? 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1789-1815 


219 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the United States ought never to have 
made war on England in 1812. 

2. Resolved, That General Hull ought to have been shot 
for his surrender at Detroit. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Imagine yourself on a merchant ship in 1806 bound 
from New York to England, and describe the insults offered 
to that ship by the British. Hart, How Our Grandfathers 
Lived, 228. 

2. Write a composition on the ship Constitution and its 
experiences. Adams, American Historical Review, XVIII, 
513-521; Halsey, Epochs, V, 11-20; Adams, United States, 
VI, 370-377; Barnes, Story of the American Navy, in The 
Mentor, No. 129; Hart, How Our Grandfathers Lived, 246. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Perry’s Victory. Journal of American History, VIII, 1; 
Halsey, Epochs, V, 28-36; Adams, United States, VII, 1 Id- 
127. Hart, How Our Grandfathers Lived, 248. 

2. The British Capture of Washington. Adams, United 
States, VIII. Chaps. 5 and 6; Hart, How Our Grandfathers 
Lived’ 274-281. 

3. The Battle of New Orleans. Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero 
Tales, 137-149. 

Important Dates 

1812. War with England. 

1814. Treaty of Peace. 

1815. Battle of New Orleans. 

Books to Remember 


1. H. Adams, United States. 


CHAPTER XII 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 

NEW SETTLEMENTS 

Kentucky and Tennessee. — The long wars between 
England and France, and the second war between Great 
Britain and the United States, did not stop the growth of 
America west of the Alleghanies. South of the Ohio, 
population increased very rapidly. Kentucky was ad¬ 
mitted into the Union in 1792, while Washington was 
still President, less than twenty years after Boone had 
made the first settlement there. Tennessee became a 
state within thirty years of her first settlement. 

The Settlement of Ohio. — Immediately after the 
Northwest Ordinance was passed by the old Congress 
of. the Confederation, a group of New England pioneers 
began the American settlement of what was then known 
as the Northwest Territory. This little band of pio¬ 
neers, called the Ohio Company, set out in wagons from 
eastern Massachusetts, crossed the mountains of Penn¬ 
sylvania with great struggles, and finally reached Pitts¬ 
burgh. Here they embarked in boats and rafts, in which 
they floated down the Ohio River until they came to 
the present site of the town of Marietta. The new 
settlement which they established at this point was 
named Marietta in honor of Queen Marie Antoinette 
of France. It quickly outstripped in population the 

220 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


221 


existing French settlements of the territory, of Detroit, 
Vincennes, Kaskaskia, and Cahokia, Cincinnati was 
also settled in 1788, and Cleveland in 1796. 



Ohio Flatboat With Superstructure of Rough Lumber 

Craft of this sort were used bj r families who intended to use 
the lumber for house building after reaching their destinations. 


Expeditions against the Indians. — To protect the 
new settlements from attack, President Washington 
sent three military expeditions against the Indians of 
the Ohio country between the Ohio River and Lake 
Erie. Each accomplished difficult marches through the 
wilderness north from Cincinnati and constructed nu¬ 
merous forts. The first; two expeditions were put to 
utter rout, with the result that the victims of the 
scalping knife were numbered by the hundred. Al¬ 
though Washington’s parting words to the commander 
of the* second expedition had been, “ You know how 
the Indians fight; beware of a surprise,” the commander 
allowed himself to be taken off his guard. A third 
expedition in 1794, with General Wayne at its head, 
conquered the savages of the whole region at the battle 


























222 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


of Fallen Timbers, near the western end of Lake Erie. 
“ Wayne,” said the Indians, “ we cannot surprise, for 
he is a chief who never sleeps.” 

The* Battle of Tippecanoe. — After their defeat by 
Wayne the Indians remained quiet for almost a score 
of years, until an ambitious leader, Tecumseh, formed 
the plan of uniting the various tribes for a determined 



The Start of the Ohio Company from Ipswich, Massachusetts, 

for Marietta, Ohio 


stand against the encroaching whites. This was just 
before the opening of the war of 1812. General William 
Henry Harrison led the whites, and engaged the enemy 
at Tippecanoe, at the junction of a creek of that name 
with the Wabash in northern Indiana. Harrison, like 
so many of his predecessors in Indian warfare, allowed 
himself to be surprised by the savages, although he 
came out a victor in the end. Fighting began in the 
























THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


223 


early morning at the very tent doors of the soldiers, 
and raged with intense fury. More than 100 whites 
were killed or wounded, and an unknown but very 
large number of the Indians. After this decisive battle, 
settlement of the region went on rapidly, and when 
the second war with England was over Indiana and 
Illinois were populous enough to be admitted into the 
E T nion and became states. 



Ax Early Frontier Fort in Ohio 


Andrew Jackson and the Southwest. — South from 
the new state of Tennessee the same scenes were enacted, 
the same struggles went on between the races. Andrew 
Jackson, the hero of New Orleans, was the great Indian 
fighter in this part of the frontier, and like William 
Henry Harrison in the Northwest he was successful in 
freeing his country from the savages. Settlement here 
too went on rapidly. Mississippi and Alabama were 
admitted into the Union at about the same time as 
Indiana and Illinois. 

COMMUNICATION AND TRANSPORTATION 

The Mohawk Trail. — The part played in southern 
history on the seaboard by the Great Wagon Road 
















224 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


southwest from Philadelphia through the Shenandoah 
Valley had its counterpart in the north, between the 
Hudson River and the Great Lakes, in the Mohawk 
Trail. This was an old Indian trail running from New 
England to the Hudson River, and west from the Hud¬ 
son along the Mohawk River through the country of 
the Iroquois Indians, to the Niagara River and Buffalo. 
Later the same route has been followed by a great New 



Overland Travel 


York State Road, by the Erie Canal, and by the New 
Y ork Central Railroad; and now automobiles and giant 
trains rush on over these great thoroughfares, where 
once were only covered wagons, row boats, and rafts. 
West from Albany to the Great Lakes many towns 
sprang up along the way, including Utica, Syracuse, 
Rochester, and Buffalo. 

The Cumberland Road. — West from Cumberland, 
Maryland, on the Potomac, Congress built a highway 



THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


225 


in the interests of the new West. This has been known 
as the Cumberland Road. For the first 40 or 50 miles 
the road ran over the route that Braddock had taken, 
but instead of following that route north to the forks 
of the Ohio, it branched off straight to the west, passed 



The Cumberland Road 


through Columbus, Ohio, Indianapolis, Indiana, and 
ultimately reached the eastern bank of the Mississippi, 
opposite St. Louis. The last hundred miles or so of the 
road Congress never graded. 

The Erie Canal. — In 1817 the state of New York be¬ 
gan, and in 1825 brought to completion the Erie Canal, 
from Albany on the Hudson, to Buffalo on Lake Erie. 
The new waterway was four feet deep, forty feet wide 
at the top and twenty-eight feet at the bottom. It over¬ 
came the difference of elevation between the Hudson 
and Lake Erie, 568 feet, bv a svstem of 83 locks. The 
undertaking cost $7,000,000, and has been improved from 
time to time. Anyone was free to navigate a boat on 
its waters by the payment of a small fee. The cost of 
transportation of freight over it was one-tenth as great 
as in wagons over the regular highways. By attracting 
to the route the heavy freight and passenger traffic to 
and from the West the people of New York City and 
of the state of New York greatly advanced their inter- 









226 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


ests, and the new towns of the West were correspondingly 
benefited. At the beginning of the twentieth century the 
state of New York voted $101,000,000 for the enlarge¬ 
ment and improvement of its canal system, and the pres¬ 
ent barge canal, practically a new undertaking but 
running in most cases over the route taken by the old 



Canal Boat in 1825 


Erie Canal, was the result. Despite the huge expense, 
canal traffic between Buffalo and Albany is now quite 
small. 

Railroads. — Canals were built in various parts of 
the country following the completion of the Erie Canal 
but were in general not very useful, for a rival came on 
the scene almost immediately that was destined to dis- 























THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


227 


place the new waterways almost entirely. This was the 
railroad. The use of steam to run machinery, which 
was the invention of a Scotch engineer, James Watt, 
in the days immediately preceding the Revolutionary 
War, was for a long time applied only to stationary 
machines. The distinction of first applying the power of 
steam to moving engines for the purpose of drawing 



“ DeWitt Clinton” and Train 

The first train in the state of New York, operated in 1831 
between Albany and Schenectady. 


loads from place to place fell to another British engi¬ 
neer, George Stephenson. 

John Stevens and Peter Cooper. — An American, 
John Stevens, of New Jersey, was already at work on 
the idea of the steam railroad when Stephenson’s tri¬ 
umph was announced. Undismayed, Stevens secured a 
charter, the first in the history of railroading in America, 
and went to work building a line in his native state. 
He was unlucky, however, and found it hard to attract 







228 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


capital. The first railroad engine to run successfully 
in America was built by Peter Cooper of New York 
in 1830, five years after the completion of the Erie 
Canal. His engine, the “ Tom Thumb,” made a short 
journey out of Baltimore, on what was the beginning 
of the present Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, at the then 
unheard-of rate of thirteen miles an hour. This road, 



RAIL-ROAD CAR 

the first great system begun in the United States, was 
inaugurated as a rival of the Chesapeake and Ohio 
Canal, which also ran west from Baltimore. The first 
spadeful of earth turned up in the construction of the 
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was dug by Charles Car- 
roll of Carrollton, Maryland, the last surviving signer 
of the Declaration of Independence. 

Various Railroads. — The iron roads increased slowly. 
They were laid down first on the plains of the Atlantic 
coast east of the Appalachian Mountains; and began to 
arrive west of the mountains only after some years. 












































THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


229 


The Baltimore and Ohio was the first road to reach 
beyond the Alleghanies, next was the Pennsylvania, and 
next the New York Central. 

The Steamboat. — Successful use of Watt’s new steam 
power to propel boats on the water was an American 



The u Clermont ” 

achievement entirely, the work of Robert Fulton of New 
York. He navigated a boat successfully by the new 
power from New York to Albany in 1807, five or six 
years before Stephenson in England applied the same 
power to move cargoes on land. Travel to the west 
derived a great advantage from Fulton’s invention. For 
thousands of years there had been no improvement in 
the means of transportation. Wheeled vehicles, row¬ 
boats and sailboats, had been the sole means of com¬ 
munication, until Fulton’s Clermont passed up the Hud¬ 
son. The first steamer appeared on the Ohio in 1811, 
and within a decade they were common on rivers both 
in the East and in the West. 


















230 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


Steamers on the Ocean. — Steam was first used to 

drive a boat across the Atlantic Ocean in the year 1819, 
when the Savannah , an American vessel, reached the 
other side, after a journey which was in part accom¬ 
plished under steam. For some strange reason Ameri¬ 
can investors were little interested in the Savannah 
and its achievement. Englishmen were the first to 
invest money in the development of the idea. Even 



First Steamboat from Pittsburgh to New Orleans 

the Englishmen were slow to appreciate the possibilities 
of steam navigation but in about two decades more, two 
English vessels, the Sirius and the Great Western, ap¬ 
peared in western waters, from England, having suc¬ 
cessfully completed the journey across the Atlantic 
wholly under steam power. This was the beginning 
of the present Cunard Steamship Line. 

Morse and the Electric Telegraph. — Soon after the 
success of the railroads, Professor S. F. B. Morse, a 










THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


231 


graduate of Yale College and Professor in the College 
of the City of New York, gave to the world the great 
invention of the telegraph. He spent his own fortune 
as well as $30,000 appropriated by Congress, in erecting 
telegraph poles and wires from Washington to Baltimore. 
“ What hath God wrought! ” were the words of his first 
message. 

The Atlantic Cable. — Morse predicted that some 
day he would send his messages on wires under water 
as well as by land. Progress came slowly. At first 
cables were stretched under rivers and harbors, and 
then in the Mediterranean Sea from the island of Malta 
to Egypt. The American capitalist, Cyrus AY. Field, 
and the English scientist, William Thompson, later Lord 
Kelvin, then took up the task, and by their perseverance 
made a success out of a cable under the Atlantic Ocean 
from Europe to America. Three times this long cable 
broke before success was achieved in 1866. 

OPENING UP THE LAND 

Gifts of Public Land.—Congress from the first was 
very generous in its use of the great stretches of public 
land in its possession. It set aside one million acres 
as a reward to the soldiers of the Revolutionary War. 
To General George Rogers Clark a tract of 150,000 acres 
at the Falls of the Ohio, opposite Louisville, Kentucky, 
was assigned for his own use and that of his men, as 
a recognition of the great services which these men had 
rendered in the conquest of the “ Northwest Territory ” 
from the British in the Revolutionary War. 

Selling the Public Land. — The great bulk of the 
public domain was sold to individuals. One million 


232 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


acres went to the Ohio Company of New England, which 
sent the first settlers to Marietta on the Ohio. About 
an equal amount was allotted to those settling around 



(a) 

Growth of a Pioneer Home 


Cincinnati. After a few years, however, no more pub¬ 
lic land was sold in large amounts, but settlers were 
allowed to purchase small farms at the rate of $2 per 
acre. 

Surveying the Lands. — Next to the Northwest Ordi¬ 
nance itself, the most important statute passed by the, 



Congress of the Confederation was one setting up a 
careful system of surveying the public lands before 
putting them on the market. By lines running east 



THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


233 


and west, and north and south, the land was divided 
into townships six miles square, and these in turn into 
thirty-six sections each a mile square, all uniformly 



(c) 

numbered. Boundaries were marked by trees, stones, 
or mounds of earth, and in every township section num¬ 
ber 16 was reserved for the support of the public schools. 

Making a Farm in the Primeval Forest. — The ex¬ 
periences of the frontier settlers in the great forests 
west of the Alleghany Mountains were similar to those 



(d) 

of the first settlers between these mountains and the 
Atlantic, and were well described by a French trav¬ 
eler at the end of the eighteenth century. Says this 
















234 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


writer: “ The following is the manner of proceeding in 
these improvements, or new settlements. Any man who 
is able to procure a capital of five or six hundred livres 
in our money, or about twenty-five pounds sterling, 
and who has strength and inclination to go to work, 
may go into the woods and purchase a portion of one 
hundred and fifty or two hundred acres of land, which 
seldom costs him more than a dollar or four shillings and 
sixpence an acre, a small part of which only he pays 
in ready money. There he conducts a cow, some pigs, 
or a sow, and two indifferent horses which do not cost 
him more than four guineas each. To these precautions 
he adds that of having a provision of flour and cider. 
Provided with this first capital, he begins by felling 
all the smaller trees and some strong branches of the 
large ones; these he makes use of as fences to the first 
field he wishes to clear; he next boldly attacks those 
immense oaks, or pines, which one would take for the 
ancient lords of the territory he is usurping; he strips 
them of their bark, or lays them open all around with 
his axe. These trees, mortally wounded, are the next 
spring robbed of their honors; their leaves no longer 
spring, their branches fall, and the trunk becomes a 
hideous skeleton. This trunk still seems to brave the 
efforts of the new colonists; but where there are the 
smallest chinks or crevices, it is surrounded by fire, and 
the flames consume what the iron was unable to 
destroy. But it is enough for the small trees to be 
felled, and the great ones to lose their sap. This object 
completed, the ground is cleared; the air and sun begin 
to operate on that earth which is wholly formed of rotten 
vegetables, and teems with the latent principles of pro¬ 
duction. 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


235 


“The grass grows very rapidly; there is pasturage 
for the cattle the very first year; after which they are 
left to increase, or fresh ones are bought, and they are 
employed in tilling a piece of ground which yields the 
enormous increase of twenty- or thirtyfold. The next 
year the same course is repeated; when at the end of 
two years, the planter has wherewithal to subsist, and 



Typical Log Cabin 


even to send some articles to the market ; at the end 
of four or five years, he completes the payment of his 
land, and finds himself a comfortable planter. Then 
his dwelling, which at first was no better than a large 
hut formed by a square of the trunks of trees, placed 
upon one another, with the intervals filled by mud, 
changes into a handsome wooden house, where he con¬ 
trives more convenient and certainly much cleaner com¬ 
partments than those in the greatest part of our small 





236 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


towns. This is the work of three weeks or a month; his 
first habitation that of eight and forty hours. 

“ I shall be asked, perhaps, how one man, or one 
family can be so quickly lodged? I answer that in 
America a man is never alone, never an isolated being. 
The neighbors, for they are everywhere to be found, 
make it a point of hospitality to aid the new farmer. 
A cask of cider drunk in common, and with gaiety, or 



Mail Carrier About 1800 


a gallon of rum, are the recompense for these services. 
Such are the means by which North America, which one 
hundred years ago was nothing but a vast forest, is 
peopled with three million inhabitants.” 

Making a Farm in the Prairie Country. — In Illinois 
the western-going emigrants reached the broad prai¬ 
ries of the interior. The country was flat, and in large 
measure treeless. Newcomers could enter at once on 
its fine lands, prepared for them by nature, with¬ 
out first undergoing the arduous labor of clearing and 













THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


237 


girdling, which had been bestowed on almost every acre 
west from the Atlantic. Farming and grazing could be¬ 
gin at once and on a large scale. Great spreading fields 
of grass, untouched by the hands of civilized men, in¬ 
vited the settlers, their flocks and their herds, to come 
and partake of the bounty. 

Grubbing, Plowing, and Fencing—On the rolling 
prairies grubbing superseded clearing and girdling. To 
prepare the land for plowing, the farmer, with his mat¬ 
tock, had to grub out the sprouts, roots, and stumps of 
all undergrowth. An acre could be grubbed in from 
three to six days. To turn over the heavy prairie sward 
required a strong team and a large sharp plow, while to 
split the necessary fence rails was the next enormous 
task. 

Suggestive Questions 

Why did the settlements of new states always mean trouble 
with the Indians? What was the first state admitted into 
the Union south of the Ohio River? What was the first state 
admitted north of the river? Locate Marietta on the map. 
How many expeditions did Washington send against the 
Indians of Ohio? Who was the hero of Tippecanoe? Who 
was the leading Indian fighter in the south? 

2. Name the leading towns along the Mohawk Trail. Be¬ 
tween what two towns was this route? What was the Cum¬ 
berland road? Why did Congress build it? Why did the 
Erie Canal build up New York City and Buffalo? In what 
respects are railroads superior to canals? Where was the 
first railroad in the United States? For what do we remember 
James Watt, John Stevens, Peter Cooper, George Stephenson, 
and Robert Fulton? What were the Sirius and the Great 
Westernf For what were S. F. B. Morse and Cyrus W. Field 
famous? 

3. Near what city of the present day did George Rogers 
Clark receive a grant of land from Congress? What was the 
reason for the gift? Was Congress generous to the cause 


238 


THE GROWTH OF THE WEST 


of education in the schools? Why was it easier to make a 
farm in the west than in the east? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That railroads should not have been allowed, 
when they would be rivals of a canal, in which people had 
already invested their money. 

2. Resolved, That Congress ought to have made the public 
lands free from the very first. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Write a composition on the early railroads, showing 
how they were different from the railroads of the present day. 
Sparks, Expansion. 

2. The Battle of Tippecanoe. Roosevelt, The Winning of 
the West. 

3. Making a farm in the wilderness, either in Illinois or in 
New York. 


Topics for Further Study 

1. The Erie Canal. Sparks, Expansion, 259-269; Halsey, 
Epochs, V, 161-175. 

2. The Mohawk Trail. Hulbert, Historic Highways. 

3. The Atlantic Cable. Halsey, Epochs, IX, 70-82. 

Important Dates 


1788. Marietta. 

1807. Fulton’s Clermont. 

1825. Erie Canal. 

1831. Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. 
1844. The telegraph. 

1866. The Atlantic cable. 


Books to Remember 

1. A. B. Hulbert, Historic Highways. 


CHAPTER XIII 


FOUR CENTURIES OF EXPLORATION 
ON THE PACIFIC COAST 

EARLY VOYAGES TO THE PACIFIC COAST 

Introduction. — The progress of geographical knowl¬ 
edge of North America was such that the Pacific coast 
did not secure a place in the history of the United States 
till the presidency of George Washington. A single 
English voyage of exploration touched the coast of Cal¬ 
ifornia before 1600, but England did not become seri¬ 
ously interested in the far away Pacific coast of America 
till she lost her colonies on the Atlantic. The Ameri¬ 
cans of the Atlantic were even slower in taking any 
interest in the western coasts. 

The Early Spanish Voyages. — The early Spaniards 
explored the Pacific coast of America, with the same 
purpose with which they had explored the Atlantic coast 
and the interior of the continent. They were interested 
only to find new sources of mineral wealth. Disappointed 
in each case, they transferred their interests from North 
America to the mines of Mexico and Peru. First, Fran¬ 
cisco de Ulloa sailed into the Gulf of California in the 
days of Cortez. Second, at about the same time, Ca- 
brillo coasted north along California probably as far as 
Cape Mendocino, discovering the port of San Diego, 
which he called San Miguel. Third, at the beginning 

239 


240 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 


of the seventeenth century, while Gosnold, Pring, and 
Weymouth were on the coast of New England, Viscaino 
on the coast of California again reached the port of 
San Diego, which he renamed from the feast of San 
Diego. Later he discovered the port of Monterey. 
Neither Cabrillo nor Viscaino saw the Golden Gate. 



In which Drake sailed around the world, 1577-1580. 


Circumnavigation of the Globe by Sir Francis Drake. 

— In the years 1577--1580, in the days of Spain’s su¬ 
premacy on sea, while England dared only harass the 
Spanish navy but not attack it openly, Francis Drake, 
one of the most dauntless of the English sea-dogs, robbed 
of its treasure every Spanish ship and settlement 
which he could find on the west coast of South America. 
He lived to bring his ship, the Pelican , back to Eng¬ 
land with 27 tons of silver as booty. Queen Elizabeth 




































EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 241 

apologized to Spain for his acts, but at the same time 
honored Drake with knighthood and took a share of 
the booty. It was the first circumnavigation of the 
globe since the days of Magellan, the second in the 
history of the world. Three other world-encircling voy¬ 
ages followed in the next quarter of a century, headed 
successively by the Englishman Cavendish, the Dutch¬ 
man Olivarius van der Nort, and the two Dutchmen, 
Le Maire and van Schouten. 

Drake’s Nova Albion. — Just as Drake was setting 
out, the report reached England, and was universally 
believed, that Martin Frobisher had discovered the At¬ 
lantic entrance of the Northwest Passage. Drake, after 
leaving Spanish South America on his way home, skirted 
along the coast of North America to 43° North Lati¬ 
tude, near the present Cape Blanc, searching every¬ 
where, it may be guessed, for the Pacific entrance of 
the Passage. The cold of the northern regions turned 
him back, and he spent the months of June and July, 
1579, on a “ fair and good bay ” in 38° North Latitude, 
which most people now believe was San Francisco Bay. 
Contemporary and later writers identified his landing 
place with the present San Francisco Bay and named 
the port after him, almost two hundred years before 
the present city was founded in 1776. One who accom¬ 
panied Drake quaintly wrote: “ At our departure hence 
our general set up a monument of our being there; as 
also of Her Majesty’s name, the day and the year of 
our arrival there, with the free giving up of the prov¬ 
ince and people into Her Majesty’s hands, together 
with Her Highness’s picture and arms, in a piece of six¬ 
pence of current English money under the plate, where- 
under was also written the name of our general.” 


242 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 


Father Kino. — After the days of Viscaino, while the 
English, the French, and other nationalities were set¬ 
tling the Atlantic coast, most geographers believed that 
California was an immense island. They continued in 
this belief for the entire seventeenth century, until the 
German Jesuit, Father Kino, dispelled it at the begin¬ 
ning of the eighteenth century. He traveled for thou¬ 
sands of miles on horseback in the southern parts of 
California, and published a map of his wanderings 
which proved the insular theory to be false. 

Bering’s Discovery of Alaska. — In 1741 Vitus Ber¬ 
ing, a Dane employed by the Russian government, who 
had already discovered the strait between Asia and 
America, discovered the American continent, in the 
vicinity of the present Mt. St. Elias in Alaska. The 
world took little notice, seemed in fact to have no 
interest in the exploit, till Russian successors of Bering 
sailed southward on the new American coasts, made 
several settlements, and inaugurated the valuable fur 
trade that attracted the eyes of the whole world to the 
northwest coast of America. 


RIVALRY OVER THE FUR TRADE OF THE 
NORTHWEST COAST 

New Spanish Voyages. — The Spaniards in Mexico 
were aroused. Jealous of the intruding Russians from 
the north, and fearful for their own hold on the Pacific 
coast, the Spaniards in Mexico sent expedition after 
expedition after 1769 into California. Some went by 
land and several by sea. One of these expeditions, led 
by Anza, reached San Francisco Bay overland in Inde¬ 
pendence year, 1776. Some of his successors founded 


EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 243 

the city of San Francisco on September 17 of this same 
year. San Diego, Monterey, and several Francisan 
missions antedated San Francisco by several Nears; 
and a score or more missions of the same order were 
scattered about the coast of California in the next few 
years. A few Spanish missions were set up at this same 
time in the southwest part of the United States, as far 
east as Texas. 

San Francisco. — In the language of Pedro Font, one 
of her founders: “The port of San Francisco is a 
wonder of nature, and may be called the port of ports, 
on account of its great capacity and the various bights 
included in its littoral or shore and in its islands. The 
mouth of the port, which appears to be very easy of 
access and safe, may be about a league in length, and 
rather more than a league in width on the outside look¬ 
ing to the sea, and about a quarter of a league on the 
inside looking toward the port. The inner end of the 
entrance is formed by two very steep and high cliffs, 
on this side a white cliff, and on the other side a red 
one, and they face directly south and north. The outer 
end of the entrance is formed on the other side by 
some great rocks, and on this side by a high and sandy 
hill, which almost ends in a round point and has at its 
skirt in the water some white rocks like little farallones. 

. . . The commander decided to erect the Holy Cross 
on the extremity of the white cliff at the inner point 
of the entrance to the port, and we went there at eight 
o'clock in the morning. We ascended a small low hill, 
and then entered a table-land entirely clear, of consid¬ 
erable extent, with a slight slope toward the port; it 
must be about a half a league in width and a little 
more in length, and keeps narrowing until it ends in 


244 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 


the white cliff. This table-land commands a most 
wonderful view, as from it a great part of the port is 
visible, with its islands, the entrance, and the ocean, 
as far as the eye can reach, even farther than the far- 
allones. The commander marked this table-land as the 
site of the new settlement, and the fort which is to be 
established at this port, for, from its being on a height, 
it is so commanding that the entrance to the mouth 
of the port can be defended by musket fire, and at 
a distance of a musket shot there is water for the 
use of the people, that is, the spring or pond, w T here 
we halted.” 

Captain Cook’s Three Voyages. — England had a num¬ 
ber of bold explorers on the sea at about this time, intent 
on grabbing a part of the new coast “ on the back of 
America ” and seizing its interesting fur trade. The 
greatest of these seamen of English birth was Captain 
James Cook, of whom it was said by a contemporary 
that “ perhaps no science ever received greater additions 
from the labors of a single man than geography did from 
those of Captain Cook.” 

The First Voyage. — On his first voyage, 1768-1771, 
outward via Cape Horn and homeward via Cape of 
Good Hope, following after certain contemporary Eng¬ 
lishmen and Frenchmen, who had set out before him, 
Cook rediscovered the continent of Australia, which had 
first been discovered by the Dutch and called New 
Holland, but had then been neglected and almost for¬ 
gotten. Thus he gave to his own country a title to 
the great southern land, and New Holland became the 
English Australia. Cook named the Friendly Islands, 
discovered and named the Society Islands after the 
Royal Society of London, and gave the world definite 


EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 245 

proof that New Zealand was composed of two large 
islands both separate from Australia. 

The Second Voyage. — On his second voyage, 1772- 
1775, outward via Cape of Good Hope and homeward 
via Cape Horn, Cook discovered New Caledonia, named 
the New Hebrides, which had been seen by others be¬ 
fore him, and practically circumnavigated the globe under 
the shadow of the South Pole, in search of an as¬ 
sumed Antarctic continent. He was probably the first 
human being to cross the Antarctic Circle. On his re¬ 
turn home he rediscovered and in the name of England 
took possession of the island of Georgia, an Antarctic 
island east of Cape Horn. He found the island swarm¬ 
ing with seals, and succeeded in turning over to England 
a new center of seal hunting and a new supply of ani¬ 
mal oil for the lighting of England. Americans built 
up a large seal fishery here early in the nineteenth 
century. 

The Third Voyage—On his third voyage, 1776-1780, 
outward via Cape Horn and homeward via Cape of Good 
Hope, past southern Australia, New Zealand, the 
Friendly Islands, and the Society Islands, Cook redis¬ 
covered the Sandwich Islands, which he named after his 
patron, Lord Sandwich in England, but which the Span¬ 
iards had known before him. Then he went to the west 
side of North America, to find the Pacific outlet of the 
Northwest passage. The same search had attracted every 
English explorer of note on the sea for three centuries. 
Cook expected to sail through the long passage from 
west to east, and to emerge north of North America into 
the Atlantic. In Independence year, 1776, after he had 
set out from England on this third voyage, when the 
rebellion was breaking out in America which was to 


246 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 

% 

cost the Mother Country the heart of her colonial em- 
pire, England sent an expedition to the east side of 
North America, to find the eastern entrance and to meet 
Cook as he emerged. Another expedition left England 
the next year, to look again for Cook in the waters of 
the North Atlantic! 

Attracted by the exploits on the Pacific coast of both 
the Spaniards and the Russians, Cook journeyed much 
farther north than his predecessors, and won the repu¬ 
tation of being the only man in his day who had sailed 
within both the Antarctic and the Arctic Circles. He 
gave names to various points in Alaska, including Cape 
Prince of Wales, the westernmost point of North Amer¬ 
ica. But he met an untimely death in the Sandwich 
Islands at the hands of the natives, and the men of 
the expedition started homeward by way of China, 
where they were successful in inaugurating a valuable 
fur trade. At that time and for many years to come 
traders gathered furs for trinkets on America’s north¬ 
west coast, and exchanged them in China for the val¬ 
uable tea, silk, porcelain, and other Chinese articles, 
which netted them in the markets of New York, Boston, 
and London fabulous profits, sometimes amounting to 
1,000 per cent. 

Cook’s Followers. — Captain Cook did not partici¬ 
pate in the Revolutionary War. Though he was an 
Englishman, Washington, Franklin, and their fellow- 
citizens were as much interested in him as if they were 
still loyal subjects of the Crown. When his return from 
the North Pacific and the Arctic Seas was momentarily 
expected by the whole world in 1779 and 1780, the 
American privateers and ships of war were warned by 
minister Benjamin Franklin from Paris not to lay hostile 


EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 247 

hands on the expedition. Stirred by the narrative of 
his third voyage, which appeared in London in 1784. 
countless new expeditions set out from England, France, 
and America, to participate 
in the rich American-Chinese 
trade. The Russians had en¬ 
gaged in this trade to a slight 
extent but had kept it more or 
less a secret. Cook’s third nar¬ 
rative revealed it to the whole 
world. 

Discovery of the Columbia 
River. — The ships of the 
United States now come into 
the unfolding story of ex¬ 
ploration of the western coast 
of North America. Captain John Kendrick in the 
Columbia and Captain Robert Gray in the Lady Wash¬ 
ington arrived on the coast from Boston in 1788. The 
Columbia, returning home by way of the Cape of Good 
Hope, was the first vessel sailing under the American 
flag to circumnavigate the globe. In another voyage in 
the Columbia in 1792 Gray found the river now named 
in his ship’s honor, and sailed around the world a second 
time. By right of discovery the United States now had 
a valid claim to all the country drained by the river 
that the Boston captain had discovered. 

Captain Vancouver. — Cook and many others had 
sailed past the mouth of the Columbia without per¬ 
ceiving it. In 1792, at Nootka Sound on Vancouver 
Island, Gray fell in with another prominent Englishman 
on the coast, Captain George Vancouver, who had also 
failed to find the Columbia. Vancouver was a com- 



Medal Struck for the 
Voyage of the Columbia 








248 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 


petent British naval officer, who had been with Cook 
on the latter’s third voyage, and with Rodney in the 
West Indies on the occasion of the great British victory 
over the French, April 12, 1782. He spent almost five 
years on the new coast, examining it with minute care 
from southern California to Alaska. He almost cer¬ 
tainly would have found the Columbia River, if Gray 
had not anticipated him. Vancouver discovered the 
Strait of San Juan de Fuca, circumnavigated the large 
island which is now named after him, and scattered 
about numerous geographical names, such as Mt. Saint 
Helens, Mt. Rainier, and Mt. Baker. 1 Mt. Hood was 
named by one of Vancouver’s men for Admiral Hood 
of the British navy, and Mt. Olympus by another Eng¬ 
lishman after the famous mount of Greek antiquity. 
Like Cook, Vancouver was forever looking for the Pa¬ 
cific outlet of the Northwest Passage. 

Hearn and Mackenzie. — In 1771 Samuel Hearn, in 
the service of the great English fur-trading company, 
the Hudson Bay Company, accomplished an overland 
journey of 1,300 miles on foot from Hudson Bay to the 
Arctic Ocean. Alexander Mackenzie in 1789 reached 
the Arctic Ocean by the Mackenzie River, named for 
him, and four years later discovered the northern part 
of the Rocky Mountains. He was the first white man 
to cross these mountains to the Pacific. Farther south 
the Rocky Mountains had been seen by the sons of the 
Frenchman, Sieur de la Verenderye, on January 1, 1743, 
near the upper waters of the Missouri River. But these 
early French explorers did not cross the mountains to 
the Pacific. 

1 These names were in honor of (1) the British ambassador 
in Madrid at this time, (2) an officer in the English navy, and 
(3) one of Vancouver’s own men. 


EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 249 


EXPANSION OF THE UNITED STATES 
OVERLAND TO THE PACIFIC 

The Purchase of Louisiana. — Like all well-informed 
Americans of his day President Thomas Jefferson was 
acquainted with the Spanish and Russian explorations 
on the Pacific coast, and with the things accomplished 
by Cook, Gray, Vancouver, and others. He wanted 
to link up his own country in the east with the Columbia 
River regions, to which Gray had given the nation such 
a good title. Therefore, when, in answer to his offer 
to France to buy from that country the city of New 
Orleans and the surrounding French territory east of 
the Mississippi, France surprised him by offering to 
sell not only this territory but also the whole interior 
of America west of the Mississippi, known as Louisiana, 
which France had then but recently received back from 
Spain, he took up the offer. The Senate of the United 
States approved of the step. Whether or not the new 
acquisition extended to the Pacific, was in doubt. It 
probably extended only to the top of the Rocky Moun¬ 
tains, but there had never been any definite boundary 
line to mark where Louisiana ended in the west. 

Benefits of the Purchase. — To the people of that 
part of the United States that lay we§t of the Appala¬ 
chians, in the valleys of the Ohio and the Mississippi, 
it was a great advantage to be enabled to ship their 
products down the Mississippi and into the Gulf of 
Mexico, free from any control by a foreign nation at 
New Orleans. This they could now do, since both banks 
of the Mississippi, including New Orleans, were safely 
in the hands of the United States. Possibly it was an 


250 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 


even greater advantage to the growing republic to ac¬ 
quire the great plains from the Mississippi to the Rock¬ 
ies, where there would be plenty of room for growth 
in the future. 

The Constitutionality of Annexation. — President 
Jefferson and his followers in Congress, who in theory 
believed in construing the meaning of the Constitution 
very strictly, at first took the position that annexation 
of new territory was not possible under the Constitution, 
because the Constitution did not in so many words give 
Congress the right to take such action. They swallowed 
their scruples, however, and voted at last to carry 
the annexation into effect. Their scruples were ill- 
founded, as the Supreme Court itself announced in a 
few years. Annexation of foreign territory to the United 
States was within the Constitution, in the opinion of 
the court. 

The Expedition of Lewis and Clark. — President Jef¬ 
ferson sent two young army captains, Lewis and Clark, 
with a company of 32 other men, to explore the Lou¬ 
isiana country and find the Columbia River and the 
Pacific from the east. The party set out in the fall of 
1803, and spent the first winter at St. Louis. In the 
next year they went up the Missouri to Fort Mandan. 
on the upper waters of that river, where they passed 
the second winter. From here, guided by an Indian 
girl, they found their way over streams and mountains 
to the Columbia River, which they followed to within 
a few miles of its mouth, where they built Fort Clatsop. 
They spent the third winter there. The distance trav¬ 
ersed from the Mississippi to the Pacific, estimated at 
3,555 miles, occupied about eighteen months. The re¬ 
turn trip, over somewhat familiar paths, lasted from 


EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 251 


March to September, 1806. The LTiited States now had 
an uninterrupted claim from the Atlantic to the Pacific. 

Zebulon Pike. — While Lewis and Clark were in the 
Northwest, Zebulon Pike explored the headwaters of the 
Mississippi. Then he was sent by the government to 
find the source of the Red River, which was the boun¬ 
dary between Spanish Mexico and the United States. 
He came to the Arkansas River, far in the west, and 
climbed the peak now known by his name. When pass¬ 
ing farther to the south, he was arrested by the Span¬ 
iards for encroaching on their territory. He was as¬ 
suredly on Spanish territory; but he had no wicked 
intent against Spain, and was soon released. The ex¬ 
plorations of Lewis and Clark and of Pike added greatly 
to the popular knowledge of the new West. 

Jedediah S. Smith. — Down to the end of the first 
quarter of the nineteenth century geographical knowl¬ 
edge of the interior of California was surprisingly dis¬ 
torted. A single range of mountains parallel to the 
coast was known, but it was supposed that it was cut by 
rivers flowing westward into the Pacific from the interior 
of the continent. In 1825 Jedediah S. Smith traveled 
from Utah to southern California, in part on an old 
Spanish trail, thence proceeded north in the valley of 
the San Joaquin, and when near the present site of 
Sacramento turned east over the mountains back to 
his starting place. He revealed to the world what the 
Spanish Mission Fathers had undoubtedly long known 
but had kept to themselves, the existence of the two 
rivers, the Sacramento and the San Joaquin, flowing 
south and north respectively. The two rivers drained 
an extensive valley stretching from north to south more 
than four hundred miles, between two parallel ranges 


252 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 


of mountains. Great Salt Lake seems to have been 
discovered by a trapper, James Bridger, and three com¬ 
panions, who explored it in a boat of skins 1824-1825. 

Geographical Fakers. — During the long period while 
northwestern North America remained unknown to the 
people of the Atlantic seaboard, numerous geographical 
fakers came forward with wonderful tales of that coun¬ 
try. Centuries back, Juan de Fuca claimed to have 
sailed through the Northwest Passage from the Pacific 
to the Atlantic. Another reported that he had accom¬ 
plished the same feat, only in the other direction, and 
on the way had fallen in with a ship from Boston. To 
fit in with this story various bays, seas, and rivers, which 
never existed, were scattered over the maps of the far¬ 
away country. Some one invented a “ River of the 
West,” extending to the Pacific from Hudson Bay. Other 
names of this river, which was given various courses, 
were “ Long River ” and “ Origan.” Probably the tale 
arose from the Indian accounts of the authentic Oregon 
or Columbia River. The Oregon was referred to in litera¬ 
ture in the days of the American Revolution, long be¬ 
fore it was in fact discovered by the whites. Shortly 
after Gray made the voyage that gave it the name of 
Columbia, the poet, William Cullen Bryant, rendered 
the Oregon famous in his poem, Thanatopsis. 

Resume. — The long story of exploration and discov¬ 
ery in the Pacific Northwest shows what a slow and 
gradual process was the discovery of America. It took 
over three centuries to complete that which Columbus 
had begun. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. Name the early Spanish explorers on the western coast 
of the United States. Why does Sir Francis Drake deserve a 


EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 253 


place in the history of California? What strange mistake 
was made in the seventeenth century concerning the geog¬ 
raphy of California? Who was Vitus Bering? 

2. Why did the Spaniards begin expeditions along the coast 
northward from Mexico in the last half of the eighteenth 
century? When was San Francisco founded? What was 
then taking place on the Atlantic coast of the United States? 
Explain why Captain Cook and George Vancouver ought to 
be mentioned in the history of the United States. Why did 
Americans come to be interested in the Pacific coast after 
the close of the Revolutionary War? Who discovered the 
Columbia River? Name the English explorers on the Pacific 
coast. Who was the greatest of these? Why? 

3. Who was responsible for the purchase of Louisiana? 
Why was he interested in the region? What were the benefits 
of the purchase to the United States? What did Lewis and 
Clark do? Zebulon Pike? What mistakes were made con¬ 
cerning the geography of California as late as 1825? Whose 
fault was it that this land was not known sooner? Why was 
it possible for so many geographical fakers to invent stories 
about the northwestern part of North America? 

Topics for Debate 

L Resolved, That the United States had a better title 
to the Oregon country than did the British. 

2. Resolved, That the purchase of Louisiana ought never 
to have been made. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. In your own words tell the story of Captain Cook’s 
voyages. 

2. Write a description of the founding of San Francisco. 
Diary of Pedro Font, in Publications of the Academy of 
Pacific Coast History, III, No. 1. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Purchase of Louisiana. Bruce, Expansion, 24-50; Roose¬ 
velt Winning of the West, IV, 258-307. 


254 EXPLORATION ON THE PACIFIC COAST 


2. The Expedition of Lewis and Clark. Laut, Pathfinders, 
307-333; Roosevelt, Winning of the West , IV, 308-343; Roose¬ 
velt and Others, Stories of the Republic, 93; Elson, Side Lights 
on American History, 99-117. 

3. Jedediah S. Smith. Neihardt, The Splendid Wayfaring; 
Dale, Ashley Cooper Explorations. 

Important Dates 

1741. Discovery of Alaska. 

1776. San Francisco founded. 

1792. Columbia River discovered. 

1S03. Lewis and Clark set out. 


Books to Remember 

1. Captain James Cook. Voyage to the Pacific Ocean (Lon¬ 
don, 1784). 

2. Captain George Vancouver. Voyages of Discovery 
(London, 1798). 


CHAPTER XIV 


DOMESTIC POLITICS. 1815-1845 

THE TARIFF QUESTION 

Infant Industries. — The rich men of the nation did 
not at once devote their money to the building up of 
manufactures, as Washington, Hamilton and the mem¬ 
bers of Congress had expected they would, when the first 
tariff law went into effect in 1789. For some years men 
preferred to invest their money in ships, to carry goods 
to warring England and France. In this dangerous 
traffic they made huge profits and brought back goods 
desired in their home country. When finally the Em¬ 
bargo Act and the British blockade of the War of 1812 
stopped this importation of outside goods, men with 
capital to invest began to build factories in which to 
make needed goods here. These “ infant industries ” 
got quite a start before the war with England ended. 

Tariff Rates Increased.—Then came peace, and with 
it a flood of English goods, which threatened to over¬ 
whelm the “ infant industries ” by their low prices. 
Congress interfered by raising the rate of the tariff tax 
on the foreign goods. 

The Manufacture of Cotton and Woolen Goods.— 

Now began the “ industrial revolution ” in the United 
States, by which industrial workers changed from hand 
work in their own homes to machine work in factories. 


255 


256 DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 

England had begun to manufacture goods in factories, 
that is, had entered on her “ industrial revolution,” 
some years before the Revolutionary War in America. 
The change, both here and abroad, largely grew out of 
certain great inventions. The most important of these 
was the invention of the steam engine by the Scotch- 



Whitney’s Cotton Gin 


man, James Watt. The new contrivance furnished 
power to run large machines, which till then men could 
make go only by hand- or foot-power or by the power 
of running water. Watt turned water into steam, 
which was infinitely more powerful. To take the place 
of the old-fashioned spinning wheel, three other Eng- 
































DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 


257 


lishmen made new appliances that would spin several 
thousand yarns at once, and still another genius found 
a way to weave by steam instead of by hand. Samuel 
Slater) “ the father of American manufactures,” set up 



Picking Cotton, Near Atlanta, Ga. 


the new machinery in the United States for the first 
time in the year when the Constitution went into effect. 
The greater number of the early factories were in New 
England. 








258 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 


The Cotton Gin. — The cotton growers were fortu¬ 
nately enabled to increase their supply of raw material 
as rapidly as the factories could desire. A new engine 
was invented (called gin for short) which separated 
the cotton seed from the fiber with startling rapidity. 
The inventor was Eli Whitney, a Yankee school teacher 
in South Carolina. Whereas a negro by hand could 
clean a pound or so of cotton per day, by the aid of 
the gin he could clean three hundred pounds in the 
same time. Thus an adequate supply of raw material 
was guaranteed to the new cotton factories, and cotton 
was rendered a profitable crop in the southern states. 
Another influence of the gin was the portentous increase 
in the southern states of black slave labor, the only 
labor able to cultivate cotton in the hot southern cli¬ 
mate. As the cotton crop extended throughout the 
u cotton belt,” slavery extended with it. The cotton gin, 
therefore, fastened the institution of slavery on the 
country. The rapid introduction of Merino sheep from 
Spain after 1810 gave to the new woolen factories a 
supply of very satisfactory wool. 

The Iron and Coal Industry. —Even in the colonial 
days, when England suppressed manufacturing in Amer¬ 
ica, iron ore was mined for the making of tools, nails, 
and hardware of various sorts for local use. Blast fur¬ 
naces to melt and separate the iron from the ore were 
necessarily quite small, till native coal was found and 
used in them for fuel. This took place first in Pennsyl¬ 
vania. The first discovery of both iron and coal in large 
quantities was made in the western part of this state at 
the very end of the eighteenth century. The present 
great iron and coal industries of the valleys of the Alle¬ 
ghany and Monongahela Rivers, and the industrial 

4 


259 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 

greatness of the coal and iron center of Pittsburgh had 
their beginnings at this time. As the home of these 
rapidly growing industries, which were to supply the 
iron and coal on which so many other manufacturing 
activities were dependent, Pennsylvania was from the 
first, and has ever since been, in favor of a high pro¬ 
tective tariff, to keep out the manufactured products of 
Europe. 


THE ADMINISTRATIONS OF JAMES MONROE 
AND JOHN QUINCY ADAMS 

James Monroe. — After the passage of the new tariff 
law, a new banking law, and certain other legislation 
to put business on its feet, following the depression of 
the period of the late war with England, James Madi¬ 
son went out of office. He was succeeded bv James 

%/ 

Monroe. The new President was another Virginia 
statesman, who had served abroad as minister, and at 
home had been Secretary of State under President Mad¬ 
ison. In the election of 1820 there was only one party 
and one candidate. Monroe missed a unanimous elec¬ 
tion by only a single vote, which was cast for John 
Quincy Adams, because a certain elector believed that 
only Washington should have the honor of a unanimous 
election to the presidency of the LTiited States. On 
account of this general harmony of opinion the period 
has been known as the “ era of good feeling.” 

John Quincy Adams. — Monroe was succeeded in 1825 
by John Quincy Adams, who, like his father, John 
Adams, served for one term only. All other Presidents 
till that time had served for two terms This election 
of the younger Adams called into play a useful section 


260 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 


of the Constitution, that is little known. The votes of 
the presidential electors in 1824 were divided among 
four candidates, no one of whom had a majority. Ac¬ 
cordingly the House of Representatives was called upon 
to make the choice. Andrew Jackson, the military 
hero of the Southwest, was the most popular candidate 
among the people. His rivals were Henry Clay from 
Kentucky, William H. Crawford from Georgia, and 
John Quincy Adams from Massachusetts. The House 
of Representatives at last awarded the honor to John 
Quincy Adams, a man of education and ability but of 
stern character, who made few personal friends. The 
“ era of good feeling ” may be said to have ended with 
the spirited contest of 1824. 

The Tariff of Abominations. — Before Adams went 
out of office Congress once more increased the rates 
of the tariff in favor of the struggling factory owners 
of New England, greatly to the distaste of the friends of 
agriculture. The Southern factories, worked by the only 
available kind of labor, that is, slave labor, were not at 
all successful, and even a high protective tariff could do 
little for them. The Southerners in Congress were not 
able to defeat the law, but they swore vengeance against 
a tariff that did not favor agriculture, which they recog¬ 
nized as the real interest of their section. 


THE ADMINISTRATIONS OF JACKSON AND OF 
HIS IMMEDIATE SUCCESSORS 

Andrew Jackson. — The military hero of New Or¬ 
leans, whose followers always claimed that he was 
cheated out of the presidency by “ bargain and cor¬ 
ruption ” in 1824, succeeded Adams in 1828 after a 




DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 261 

hard fight. The new President was born of Scotch-Irish 
immigrant parents in South Carolina, but early moved 
west into Tennessee. He lacked the education of the 
schools, but as a plain man of the people he knew the 



Andrew Jackson 


needs of the people. He was honest, he was a good 
leader, and, because of his military reputation, he had 
the support of the people. 

The Spoils System. — One of his chosen methods to 
please his followers, was to turn out the able and ex¬ 
perienced men whom he found in office, in order to give 
their places to new and inexperienced men, his friends, 
whom he wished to reward. He believed that after a 
political contest, “ to the victor belong the spoils.” It 
was a great change, since Jackson’s predecessors in the 


262 DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 

presidential chair had made few removals. The new 
system was popular with “ the boys,” Jackson’s imme¬ 
diate political friends, and by its rewards it helped 
the President to build up a strong party; it was, how¬ 
ever, a thoroughly bad principle, which debauched and 
destroyed the efficiency of the public service. 

The Nullification Controversey. — The sectional dif¬ 
ferences of the North and the South over the “ tariff of 
abominations ” were now debated everywhere. John C. 
Calhoun, South Carolina’s popular leader, held that a 
protective tariff was unconstitutional, inasmuch as the 
Constitution nowhere gave Congress the power to pro¬ 
tect industries. Therefore he took the ground that 
when a state and the nation - disagreed over a tariff 
law, the law “ ought to be declared null and void within 
the limits of the state.” 

Daniel Webster on Nullification. — Daniel Webster 
of Massachusetts, the greatest orator of the country and 
a very able lawyer, held the doctrine of nullification up 
to scorn in a debate in the United States Senate with 
Senator Hayne of South Carolina. The latter, in agree¬ 
ment with Calhoun, took the old States’ Rights view, 
earlier expressed in the Virginia and Kentucky Resolu¬ 
tions, that each state might sit in judgment on the acts 
of Congress and nullify them, if it believed them con¬ 
trary to the Constitution. Webster poured ridicule upon 
this idea that the United States was the “ servant of 
four and twenty masters. ... It so happens that at 
the very moment when South Carolina resolves that 
the tariff laws are unconstitutional, Pennsylvania and 
Kentucky resolve exactly the reverse. . . . Does not 
this approach absurdity? ” He preferred the Supreme 
Court of the United States as a common judge of all 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 263 

the disputes between the states and the nation. For 
a state to attempt to nullify a national law would 
amount to a challenge to the national authorities to rise 
up and try to enforce the nullified act in the dissatisfied 
state. Civil war might be the result, and this- he ab- 



Daniel Webster 


horred. His closing words expressed the great ideal, 
“ Liberty and Pinion, now and forever, one and in¬ 
separable! ” 

Old Hickory in the Crisis. — Congress consented in 
1832 to lower the rates of the “ Tariff of Abominations,” 
but despite the change South Carolina still opposed 
what she considered the unfair discrimination of the 




264 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 


law against her. She called a state convention to con¬ 
sider the situation. The old military chieftain at the 
head of the government, whom the people called “ Old 
Hickory,” because of his great physical strength and 
military prowess, was not the man to play the coward 
when challenged. He threatened a certain champion 
of states’ rights that he u would hang him higher than 
Haman,” if he did not yield, and he sent the troops 
and warships of the United States to Charleston, South 
Carolina’s chief port, to collect the duties at all hazards. 

Nullification of the Tariff Law by South Carolina. — 
The people of South Carolina, however, lived up to the 
doctrine of Hayne, Calhoun, and the Virginia and 
Kentucky Resolutions, and did not back down. They 
surprised the nation by actually daring to declare the 
tariff law of the United States null and void within the 

• 

state, in the very face of Jackson’s soldiers. They 
forbade the citizens to pay the tax, and threatened 
that they would secede from the Union if the President 
attempted to enforce the law against them. The Presi¬ 
dent replied in a ringing proclamation that he v r ould 
enforce the law at all hazards. Then Congress, under 
the leadership of Clay, stepped in and passed two law's, 
one, the Force Act, to enable the President to enforce 
the law, and the other, a tariff lav% further reducing 
the rates. Appeased by the latter, the state yielded and 
repealed its ordinance of nullification, but, as if to main¬ 
tain its position, passed another law to nullify the Force 
Act. Actual clash between the soldiers and the authori¬ 
ties of the state was avoided. 

The Bank Controversy. — The Second Bank of the 
United States, chartered by Congress as a business 
measure after the depression of the period of the w r ar 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 265 

of 1812-1815, became very unpopular with the people, 
who were jealous of it and hated it because of its size 
and power. President Jackson took the same position, 
and announced that he would not sign a bill renewing 
the bank’s charter, which would run out in 1836. When 
Congress, in disregard of his position, passed a law re¬ 
newing the charter, the President made his words good 
by vetoing the measure. He won the election of 
1832 on this very question as an issue, against Henry 
Clay, the friend of the bank. The bank ceased to exist 
in 1836. 

Internal Improvements. — Jackson took the position 
of Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe before him, that the 
states and not the nation should build the roads in the 
various sections of the country. He was opposed by 
Clay and ex-President John Quincy Adams and their 
followers, who favored national aid to such improve¬ 
ments. The latter were outvoted. 

Whigs and Democrats. — Early in Jackson’s second 
term, the opponents of the President organized them¬ 
selves into a new party favoring a protective tariff, a 
national bank, and internal improvements at the ex¬ 
pense of the nation. They took the name of Whigs 
because of the popularity in America of the party of 
this name in England, which had stood out against the 
Tory government of King George III before and during 
the War of the Revolution. Clay and Webster were 
the leaders of the new party. At about the same time 
the followers of Jackson took the name of Democrats. 

President Van Buren and the Panic of 1837. — Jack¬ 
son’s Democratic party won the next presidential elec¬ 
tion, the chief magistracy going to Martin Van Buren. 
A few weeks after the latter took office, a terrible finan- 


266 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 


cial panic broke upon the country. The people had been 
so prosperous that they had speculated too heavily. 
Thousands failed in business, and “ hard times ” made 
things difficult for all classes for several years to come. 

Harrison and the Whigs. — In the political contest 
of 1840 the Whigs came into power with William Henry 
Harrison, the Indian fighter of the Northwest and the 
hero of Tippecanoe, as their leader. Tyler won with 
him, as the vice-presidential candidate. Great proces¬ 
sions and banners, and monster campaign meetings, now 
made their appearance in American political campaigns 
for the first time. The Democrats sneered at Harrison 
as the “ log cabin candidate,” but regretted it, when 
the Whigs proudly accepted the jibe, paraded log cabins 
on wheels, with coon skins nailed to the door, barrels 
of cider standing by, and with the marching thousands 
singing and shouting for “ Tippecanoe and Tyler too,” 
carried their leader into the White House. Van Buren, 
who was the Democratic candidate for the second time, 
was held responsible by the people for the panic of 
1837, and made a poor showing in the election returns. 

Tyler and the Whigs. — The Whigs had an unlucky 
four years. Their leader, Harrison, died after a month 
in office, and then Vice-President Tyler, who succeeded 
to power, refused to work with the party. When the 
Whigs in Congress passed a bill bringing back the 
national bank which Jackson’s veto had killed, Tyler, 
in one of the most faithless acts in American politics, 
wrote the word “ veto ” upon the bill. Congress passed 
it in an amended form, and again “ veto ” was written 
upon it. The incensed Whigs “ read Tyler out of the 
party ” and sought his undoing at every turn, but they 
were helpless with the President against them. So like- 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 267 

wise was “ poor Tyler ” helpless with no Congress back 
of him. Almost the only important act of legislation in 
the four years was a new tariff law, which slightly in¬ 
creased the rates; and over this the President and Con¬ 
gress wrangled terribly before it reached the statute 
books. 

The Return of the Democrats to Power. — After the 
four ill-starred vears, with little to show for their stew- 
ardship in national affairs, the Whigs lost the contest 
of 1844 to the Democrats, who were led by James K. 
Polk of Tennessee. The new administration was forced 
to devote itself almost entirely to foreign affairs and to 
the question of the expansion of slavery, two issues that 
were closely connected. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. What is a tariff law? Why is it an easy way for a nation 
to raise money? Why did Congress pass a tariff law very 
soon after it came into existence? Who was Samuel Slater? 
Who was Eli Whitney? In what way did he influence the 
agriculture of the United States? 

2. What was memorable about the presidential election 
of 1820? What state was the “ mother of presidents” for 
the first part of the nineteenth century? What was the 
“era of good feeling”? 

3. What kind of man was Andrew Jackson? What was 
the spoils system, which he introduced? What is nullification? 
Would it be a good thing for the United States? Who was 
the leader of those who favored nullification? What side did 
President Jackson take? What state favored nullification? 
What two leading parties grew up in Jackson’s time? To 
which party did Jackson belong? When did the hero of 
Tippecanoe become President? What was the rallying cry 
of his party when he was elected President? 


268 


DOMESTIC POLITICS, 1815-1845 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That it would have been good for the United 
States if the cotton gin had never been invented. 

2. Resolved, That President Jackson did more harm than 
good to his country. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. The Presidential Campaign of 1840. McMaster, United 
States, VI; Elson, Side Lights on American History, 225. 

2. Daniel Webster as an Orator. Halsey, Epochs, V, 158- 
160; Harding, Orations, 212-241; Lodge, Daniel Webster, 
117-128. 

3. Lafayette’s Visit in 1824. Elson, Side Lights on Ameri¬ 
can History, 195. 


Topics for Further Study 

1. The Debate on Nullification. Lives of Jackson and 
Webster. 

2. The Character of Andrew Jackson. Lives of Jackson; 
Sparks, The Men who made the Nation, 282-318. 

Important Dates 

1832. Nullification in South Carolina. 

1837. Financial Panic. 

1840. “ Tippecanoe and Tyler too” campaign. 

Books to Remember 

1. Carl Schurz, Henry Clay. 

2. Henry Cabot Lodge, Daniel Webster . 

3. E. M. Shepard, Martin Van Buren. 

4. W. G. Sumner, Andrew Jackson. 


CHAPTER XV 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 

RELATIONS WITH SPANISH AMERICA 

The Annexation of Florida. — During the war of 
1812-1815 the Seminole Indians and British soldiers 
had used Florida as a base of military operations against 
the United States. To stop such occurrences for all time 
and to gain a sure hold on the Gulf of Mexico, from 
which the great interior of the United States lay open 
to attack by way of the Mississippi River, President 
Monroe demanded that Spain either keep order in the 
Florida peninsula or else sell it to the United States. 
To the latter alternative Spain consented. 

Recognition of the South American Republics. — In 
the same decade, between 1810 and 1820, the revolution¬ 
ary wars of the Spanish colonies in South America 
against the Mother Country of Spain were making a 
tremendous appeal to the sympathies of the liberty- 
loving people of the United States, the first republic 
in America to shake off the political control of a Eu¬ 
ropean country. Public sentiment was overwhelmingly 
in favor of recognizing the independence of the strug¬ 
gling sister republics, just as France had recognized the 
independence of the United States during the War of 
the Revolution. Some would have followed France’s 
example even further by sending soldiers and military 

269 


270 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 


assistance of all sorts to the peoples of South America 
and Central America. President Monroe deferred tak¬ 
ing any step until he had succeeded in inducing Spain 
to cede Florida to this country. Then, after he had 
made good the title of the United States to Florida, 
not caring what objections Spain might raise against 
his course in South America, he recognized the inde¬ 
pendence of all of Spain’s American colonies, except 
Cuba and Porto Rico, and of Portuguese Brazil; but 
he refused to send them any military assistance. 

Three Problems in Foreign Affairs. — Just at this 
time a peculiar three-cornered problem confronted the 
country in its foreign relations. 

(1) Spain, backed by Russia, Prussia, Austria, and 
France, was plotting an attack on South America to 
overthrow the democratic governments of her former 
colonies and reduce them to their former allegiance. 

(2) On the Pacific coast in the Northwest, Russia, 
coming south from Alaska, had just advanced a claim 
to a part of the Oregon coast, where the United States 
already had a very good claim of her own. A clash 
for the country’s rights against Russia seemed quite 
possible. 

(3) The Greek people in Europe were aspiring to 
independence from their masters, the Turks, and were 
calling upon the great republic of the west to come 
over and help them. 

President Monroe had to make up his mind what 
to do in each of these cases. 

The Monroe Doctrine. — The President announced his 
decision in a message to Congress in 1823, and what he 
said on these questions has since been known as the 
Monroe Doctrine. 


271 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 

(1) “ We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the 
•amicable relations existing between the United States 
and those powers to declare,” said the President, “ that 
we should consider any attempt on their part to extend 
their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dan¬ 
gerous to our peace and safety. With the governments 
who have declared their independence and maintained 
it, and whose independence we have on great con¬ 
sideration and just principles acknowledged, we 
could not view any interposition for the purpose of 
oppressing them or controlling in any other manner 
their destiny by any European power, in any other light 
than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition 
toward the United States.” This meant that the demo¬ 
cratic republics of South America must not be over¬ 
thrown by monarchical Europe. 

(2) The President also judged the occasion “ proper 
for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and 
interests of the United States are involved, that the 
American continents, by the free and independent posi¬ 
tion which they have assumed and maintain, are hence¬ 
forth not to be considered as subjects for future coloni¬ 
zation by any European power.” This was a shaft 
aimed at Russia, warning her that she must withdraw 
her pretensions to the Pacific coast south from Alaska, 
in regions already claimed by the United States. 

(3) Concerning help for struggling people in Eu¬ 
rope, President Monroe said, “ In the wars of the Eu¬ 
ropean powers in matters relating to themselves, we have 
never taken any part, nor does it comport with our 
policy to do so.” In justification of this warning to the 
Greeks that the United States would not help them, the 
President felt that if this country did not desire the states 


272 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 


of Europe to interfere in America, logically she must 
herself not interfere in the political affairs of that 
continent. 

Results of the Monroe Doctrine. — Spain gave up her 
projected attack on South America, and Russia made a 
treaty, withdrawing her forces back northward on the 
Pacific, and allowing the boundary between Alaska and 
the Oregon claims of the United States to be fixed at 
54° 40' North Latitude. Fortunately, too, the Greeks 
won their independence from the Turks without the 
assistance of America. 

The Panama Congress. — The question still remained, 
how far ought the United States to go in awarding 
protection to the weak republics of South America. 
Ought the Lhfited States to make a military alliance 
with them and send them military aid, or merely stand 
as their protector before the rest of the world, ready to 
give aid when it was needed? These and kindred ques¬ 
tions came up before Congress after John Quincy Adams 
became President. Mexico, Central America, Colombia, 
and Peru invited the United States to send representa¬ 
tives to meet with them in a congress at Panama. The 
Congress of the United States with reluctance decided 
to accept the invitation, but debated the matter so long 
that the meeting had proceeded and adjourned without 
the presence of the representatives from the United 
States. Thus the country escaped committing itself to 
any definite way of helping its neighbors. Under the 
Monroe Doctrine today the United States is free to take 
any action that it itself deems wise. 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 


273 


OTHER QUESTIONS 

Oregon. — England’s claims to the northwest coast of 
America, it will be recalled, were based on the explora¬ 
tions of Drake, Cook, Vancouver, and Mackenzie; and 
those of the United States were based on the explora¬ 
tions of Gray and of Lewis and Clark, and on a fur- 



Astoria in 1813 

From Franchere’s Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast 

of America. 

trading post which some traders, sent out from New 
York by John Jacob Astor, founded in 1811 at the 
mouth of the Columbia River. It was necessary for the 
two countries to agree on some kind of a division of 
territory, but this proved difficult. Progress was slow. 
At first, in 1818, a joint occupation of Oregon was agreed 
upon with England, to run for a period of ten years; 



274 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 


this was renewed at the end of this time, with the right 
retained by each power to renounce it by a year’s 
notice. 

Dr. Marcus Whitman and his Followers. — The story 
of the exploration of the Oregon coast, as given to the 
world in Cook’s and Vancouver’s Travels , and the story 
of the great overland journey to the Pacific, as con¬ 
tained in a popular edition of Lewis and Clark’s 
Journal, had already begun to bring Oregon to the front. 
Early in the thirties eastern missionaries to the Indians, 
sent out by the American Board of Missions, arrived in 
the country. The most interesting and famous of these, 
Dr. Marcus Whitman, who went out in 1835, felt 
strongly that steps should be taken to make sure that 
the country should be American. He twice journeyed 
to the east to appeal for help, and each time led 
back settlers with him; the last time, in 1843, almost 
1,000 for the settlement at Walla Walla. Twice as 
many went out the next year, and more the year after. 
The safe arrival in the country of such large bands, 
gave to the United States a new and unanswerable claim 
to the land, the claim founded on actual settlement. 

Texas. — At this same time the Mexican state of 
Texas was coming into prominence. Hundreds of 
Americans had gone to settle on its rich lands, upon the 
offer of the Mexicans to sell to them large tracts of land 
at the wonderfully low rate of twelve and one-half cents 
per acre. Moses Austin and his son from Connecticut, 
whose family name is perpetuated in the name of the 
city of Austin, Texas, were among the earliest to take 
up the generous offer. There came also such noted 
characters as Davy Crockett of Tennessee, famous 
frontiersman, and James Bowie, well known for his 


275 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1S15-1S45 

“ bowie ” knife. There were thousands of Americans 

in Texas in a short time. It had seemed at one time 

as if the United States might be able to buv the rich 

%/ 

province; and to this end the government at Washing¬ 
ton had twice made cash offers for its cession to this 
country, but in vain. 



The Oregon Country 

The Texan War of Independence. — The new settlers 
in Texas did not get on well with their Mexican rulers. 
There were religious quarrels, for the old inhabitants 
were Roman Catholics and the newcomers mainly Protes¬ 
tants; there were also quarrels over the land grants and 
over the right of the settlers to take part in the gov¬ 
ernment. The Americans desired to have slaves, and 
the Mexicans forbade it. At last it was plain that the 






276 FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 

differences between the Mexicans and the American 
settlers could not be healed, and on March 2, 1836, the 
latter rose up and declared Texas a free and independent 



state. Whereas the American Declaration of Indepen¬ 
dence against England in 1776 had been signed by 55 
men, who hailed from southern and northern states alike, 
the declaration in Texas was signed by 56 men, almost 

/ 















277 



m 




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UU - :• ' ■ ■'•'■■' ■■« 

1 ; * - - * 


p*?$l 


: TY : £ til/ 




Mission San Francisco de la Espada, San Antonio, Texas 

Spanish mission building on the present site of the 
city of San Antonio. The President of the Mother 
Country, Santa Anna himself, led his troops in person. 
It must be said that the results of this first battle were 
not so encouraging to the cause of the insurgents in 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 

all of whom came from the southern states of the 
United States. A War of Independence resulted, open¬ 
ing with a battle at the Alamo, which was an old 















278 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 


Texas as were Concord and Lexington to the patriots 
of the Revolution in Massachusetts. The one hundred 
and fifty Americans in the Alamo were massacred to 
a man. The very next month, however, the Americans 
won the closing battle of the war at San Jacinto, in 
which the Americans were led by General Sam Houston, 
an ex-governor of the state of Tennessee, and the Mexi¬ 
cans again by their President. Six hundred Mexicans 
were slain, two hundred wounded, and their President 
captured. Texas was free. 

The ‘ 4 Lone Star State.”— General Houston was 
made President of the new republic, which was known as 



Seal of the Republic of Texas, and of the General Land 

Office of Texas 

the “ Lone Star State ” from its adoption of a single 
star in the center of a circle as its national flag. As 
the seal of the General Land Office, here shown, indi¬ 
cates, Texas had an abundance of good grazing lands 
to dispose of, and the raising of “ Texas steers ” was 
the leading industry. 

The Recognition of Texas. — Texas was destined to 
enter the United States in a manner that was at first 








279 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 

little expected. Houston and his followers had prob¬ 
ably all the time wanted Texas to join the United States, 
but President Jackson, while consenting to recognize 
Texas as a free and independent state, refused to bring 
about its annexation to this country. There the matter 
rested for some time. Even this recognition, however, 
offended the Mother Country of Mexico, which expected 
that the United States, their champion when they won 
their own independence from Spain, would now help 
them to put down their rebels. 

The Presidential Contest of 1844. — Texas and Ore¬ 
gon were prominent in the public mind in the exciting 
presidential contest of 1844. This resulted in a victory 
for the Democrats under Polk, after their defeat by the 
Whigs in 1840. The Democrats in this campaign took 
a stand for “ re-annexation of Texas and the reoccupa¬ 
tion of Oregon.” This was a bold call to expansion. It 
meant that Texas had been claimed before by the 
United States as a part of the Louisiana Purchase but 
had been relinquished in the Florida treaty of 1819. 
The call for the reoccupation of Oregon amounted to 
an assertion that Oregon belonged to the LTnited States 
by right of settlement and occupation. 

Slavery in National Politics. — To gain an adequate 
understanding of the annexation of Texas, of other 
Mexican territory, and of Oregon, which followed Polk’s 
victory, the growing controversy between the northern 
and southern states of the Union over slavery must 
be reviewed. 


280 


FOREIGN AFFAIRS, 1815-1845 


Suggestive Questions 

1. Why did the United States want Texas? Give some 
reasons why the United States was glad to see the South 
American states become free and independent. Give the 
three parts of the Monroe Doctrine, and show why each 
part was necessary. Of what service to the United States was 
the Monroe Doctrine? Do the South American states like 
it? Why are disputes liable to arise over what it means? 
W T hat was the Panama Congress? 

2. On what were the English and American claims to 
Oregon based? Review the different voyages to the Oregon 
coast. Who was Marcus Whitman? Name some Americans 
who early went to Texas. How did the Texas war of inde¬ 
pendence arise? Who were the leaders on the two sides? 

3. Why was Texas called the “Lone Star State?” Ex¬ 
plain the two issues about new territories before the people 
in the presidential campaign of 1844. 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the Monroe Doctrine is unfair to South 
America. 

2. Resolved, That the Monroe Doctrine causes too much 
trouble to the United States. Elson, Sidelights on American 
History, 168-195. 


Topics for Compositions 

1. Marcus Whitman. Bourne, Essays, 3-109; Bruce, Ex¬ 
pansion, 106-135; Sparks, Expansion, 301-323; Lodge and 
Roosevelt, Hero Tales, 171-183. 

Important Dates 

1819. Annexation of Florida. 

1823. The Monroe Doctrine. 

1836. Texas independent. 






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SCALE OF MILES 
































































































CHAPTER XVI 


SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 

THE GROWTH OF THE SLAVERY ISSUE 

Slavery and the Declaration of Independence. — In¬ 
asmuch as both the First Continental Congress and also 
the Second Continental Congress had voted to stop the 
importation of slaves, it remains a matter of wonder 
that the Declaration of Independence, which begins 
with the noble sentiment that “ all men are created 
equal,” and that the Creator endows all men with cer¬ 
tain “ inalienable rights,” among which are “ life, lib¬ 
erty, and the pursuit of happiness,” should not have 
gone on to condemn African slavery. Thomas Jefferson, 
though a Virginian, states that in his original copy of 
the Declaration of Independence he had included such 
a clause, but explains that it was struck out to please 
South Carolina and Georgia and certain even of the 
northern states. The carrying of the blacks from their 
home in Africa to the slave fields of America was largely 
a northern industry. 

Emancipation in the Northern States.— Enthusiasm 
for human rights, started by the Declaration of Inde¬ 
pendence and by the War of the Revolution did, how¬ 
ever, deliver the institution of slavery a hard blow. 
The Northern States one by one prohibited the importa- 

281 



282 SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 


tion of Africans, and gradually freed the slaves in their 
borders. Some Southerners even, like Jefferson, fa¬ 
vored taking this course in their states, although the 
majority held back. The cause of anti-slavery invaded 
Congress, where slavery was forbidden in the North¬ 
west Territory by the Ordinance of 1787. 

Slavery in the Constitution. — The Constitutional 
Convention of 1787 did not put the word slave in the 
Constitution, though it referred indirectly to the system 
in several ways, when laying down rules in regard to 
representation in the lower house of Congress, and in 
regard to direct taxes and the slave trade. At the first 
moment possible under the terms of the Constitution, 
Congress forbade the importation of slaves into the 
United States after January 1, 1808. 

The Missouri Compromise of 1820. — Congressional 
debates on slavery, growing out of the proposal to ad¬ 
mit Missouri into the LTiion, took on an unusual char¬ 
acter. For the first time the two sections of the 
Union, the North and the South, began to array them¬ 
selves on opposite sides of the question. Southerners 
were for slavery because they had come to see by this 
time that slaves were profitable to them on their tobacco, 
cotton, and sugar plantations, while the Northerners, 
who perceived no economic benefit to themselves from 
the system, opposed it, and brought up moral argu¬ 
ments against it. True lovers of their country were 
alarmed that the slavery discussion had taken on this 
sectional character. The debates in Congress were long 
and bitter, but after a while, largely through the influ¬ 
ence of Henry Clay, Congress adopted the so-called 
Missouri Compromise. (1) Missouri was to come into 
the Union as a slave state, but it was stipulated that 


SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 283 

there should be no slavery in the remaining part of the 
Louisiana country purchased from France, north of 36° 
30' North Latitude, the southern boundary of Missouri. 
(2) At the same time Maine was admitted as a free 
state. The principle of offsetting a new slave state by a 
new free state was thus established, and precedent set 
for discussion of slavery along sectional lines, whenever 
the question of creating new states came up. Both these 
results were unfortunate for the peace of the country. 
The South later on was sorry that it had agreed not to 
take slaves into the northern parts of the Louisiana 
Purchase. 

The Missouri Compromise Line. — The division line 
between slaverv and freedom in the west, which ran 
from the southwestern point of Missouri straight west 
through the northern strip of the present state of Okla¬ 
homa, was comparatively short. Its length was about 
287 miles, which was the width of the Louisiana coun¬ 
try at that point. The Mason and Dixon boundary line 
between Pennsylvania and Marvland, the boundarv 
between slavery and freedom in the east, was a little 
shorter, 267 miles. 

The Abolitionists. — The agitation o'f the question 
of slavery in and out of Congress was now violent and 
would not down. Stirred by such leaders as Benjamin 
Lundv and William Lloyd Garrison, the public began 
to take sides. Little groups, called abolitionists, ap¬ 
peared here and there in the Northern States, agitating 
for social revolution of an extreme type. They de¬ 
manded nothing less than the immediate abolition of 
slavery in all the states and the denial of compensation 
to the owners for the loss of the blacks, whom it was 
proposed to free. The social equality of the blacks and 


284 SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 

the whites was even called for. The emancipation of 
the time of the Revolutionary War had been gradual 
in its effects, and in most cases compensation had been 
given to the owners. Also social equality between the 
whites and the blacks had not then been insisted upon. 
The Southerners were terribly in earnest in their hatred 
of the new doctrines of freedom. They burned every 



William Lloyd Garrison 


copy of Garrison’s little paper, the Liberator, that they 
could lay hands on, and they offered rewards of thou¬ 
sands of dollars for the arrest of the abolition editor. 
Most Northerners joined the Southerners at this time in 
condemning the extreme abolitionists. 

The Liberty Party. — The immediate followers of 
Garrison, agreeing with their leader that the Constitu¬ 
tion of the United States, which failed to put a ban 


SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 285 


on slavery, was “ a covenant with death and an agree¬ 
ment with hell,” denounced that document. Their 
motto was “No union with slave-holders”; and they 
refused to vote or to hold office, under a government with 
a tainted Constitution. Their opposition never took 
political form. A group of abolitionists in the North¬ 
western States, however, went into politics in 1840, and 
organized the Liberty Party, the first political organi¬ 
zation in the United States in the interests of eman¬ 
cipation. 

Anti-Slavery Opposition to the Annexation of Texas. 

— When the subject of the annexation of Texas and 
Oregon was before the voters of the country in 1844, 
many took the anti-slavery position for the first time. 
They scorned being classed with the abolitionists; they 
were willing to let slavery alone in the South, but they 
knew that Texas, in the Union, would be a slave state; 
and they were opposed to the territorial extension of 
slavery. 


THE MEXICAN WAR AND TERRITORIAL 

EXPANSION 

The Annexation of Texas. — After the people on elec¬ 
tion day, 1844, put Polk and the Democrats into office 
and thus showed that they desired the annexation of 
Texas, Congress passed a resolution formally inviting 
Texas to come into the Union. Texas accepted the 
invitation, and was admitted as a state toward the end 
of the year 1845. This was the fourth expansion of 
national territory. There had been, first, the extension 
of the seaboard states to the Mississippi by the treaty 


286 SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 



San Antonio 


Corpus Christy 


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STRUTHERS 1 CO.N.Y 


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San LuiS'Potosi 


V-.., M. 

C w mm 

r—r4 




SCALE OF MILES 

0 50 100 200 


The Mexican War 











SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 287 

of peace with England in 1783; second, the annexation 
of Louisiana; third, that of Florida; and now, fourth, 
this of Texas. This last, however, contained in it the 
germs of future strife, for Mexico herself, far from 
ever having formally let Texas go free, still claimed 
her as a Mexican state. Her position was that if the 
United States took in her province of Texas, war be¬ 
tween Mexico and the United States would surely be 
the result. This she announced in plain and unequiv¬ 
ocal language. 

War with Mexico. — A short war with Mexico opened 

in the spring of the next year, 1846, and lasted a little 

over a year. The first blows came on the northern bank 

of the Rio Grande River, at Palo Alto and Reseca de 

la Palma, in a narrow strip of land which Mexico had 

never considered as part of the province of Texas. The 

Americans advanced into this strip and the Mexicans 

tried to drive them out. There were battles on the 

southern banks of the river at Monterev and Buena 

*/ 

Vista. The United States perceived by this time that 
such fighting on the edge of Mexico, although victory 
in every case was on their side, would lead to no de¬ 
cisive results. General Winfield Scott, who had won 
his spurs as a young soldier in the army of his country 
at Chippewa and Lundy’s Lane in the second war with 
Great Britain, was sent on the sea to Vera Cruz. He 
took the city, and, landing, won a series of victories in 
his march over the stretch of two hundred miles inland to 
Mexico City, the capital of the country. He captured 
Mexico City itself, and this ended the war. 

New Mexico and California. — In the meantime New 
Mexico had been taken in the north, and California on 
the Pacific. The conquest of the latter country was 


288 SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 


San Francisco 
i£de Solano 


Francisco 
Assis 
'Santa Clara 



C W° n '° 

Sa'llMa'a 


The 

Missions and Chapels 
of 

CALIFORNIA 

Si Missions Chapels 


Diego 

Alcala 




SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 289 


made by Commodore Kearney, assisted by General 
Fremont and by Commodore Stockton of the navy. 

The Treaty of Peace. — By the treaty of peace the 
United States received California and New Mexico, and 
paid over to Mexico $15,000,000. It goes without 
saying, also, that Texas including the disputed strip on 
the northern banks of the Rio Grande, though unmen¬ 
tioned in the treaty, remained with the United States. 
Five years later Mexico sold to the United States for 
$10,000,000 a small strip of land, known as the Gadsden 



Scott’s March to Mexico 

Purchase, in what is now 1 southern Arizona and New 
Mexico. At the expense of $75,000,000 in money and 
10,000 lives, which was a cheap war, as wars go, both 
in money and men, the United States thus accomplished 
the sixth territorial expansion in its history. Cheap as 
the war was from the point of view of the present day, 
the annexation which it accomplished was the most 
costly to that time. 

Oregon, the Fifth Territorial Annexation. — One 

month after the war with Mexico started, the 
United States compromised its long dispute with Eng- 











290 SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 


land over Oregon, by dividing the country. “ Fifty- 
four forty or fight,” which had been the slogan in the 
presidential campaign of 1844, when the “ reoccupation 
of Oregon ” was demanded, meant that the LTnited 
States demanded all of Oregon up to 54° 40' North 
Latitude, the southern boundary of Alaska. The com¬ 
promise was accepted, in order to avert a possible war 



Sutter’s Mill 


with England and to prevent that country from helping 

Mexico. One war at a time was quite enough for 

President Polk. By the terms of the arrangement the 

United States took that part of Oregon which was 

south of the parallel of 49°, England the part between 

this line and Alaska. The arrangement was an extension 
• _ 

to the Strait of San Juan de Fuca of the already exist¬ 
ing line between British Columbia and the L T nited States 
west from Lake Superior. 






SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 291 


Six Territorial Acquisitions. — Texas in 1845, Oregon 
in 1846, and California and New Mexico in 1848 brought 
to the country more territory than had the treaty of 
peace with England in 1783, or the purchase of Louisi¬ 
ana, or that of Florida. Taken together, the first three 
annexations had added to the national domain 1,700,000 
square miles, the last three, 1845-1848, 1,200,000 square 
miles. 

The Discovery of Gold in California. — A week or so 
before the treaty of peace with Mexico James W. Mar¬ 
shall by accident discovered gold at Sutter’s Mill in 
California, forty miles from the present city of Sacra¬ 
mento. The news spread like wildfire. Soon thousands 
were on their way to the diggings from every quarter 
of the civilized world, particularly from the Atlantic 
coast of the United States. In twelve years over $500,- 
000,000 worth of gold was obtained, and the little 
mission village of San Francisco expanded into a city 
of 56,000 people. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. Explain the attitude of the two Continental Congresses 
toward slavery? Why was slavery not condemned in the 
Declaration of Independence? What was the effect of the 
Revolutionary War on slavery? Tell what mention the Con¬ 
stitution makes of slavery? What was the Missouri Com¬ 
promise, and why was it necessary? What was its effect on 
slavery? What did the abolitionists want? What was the 
Liberty party? 

2. Why did the annexation of Texas lead to war with 
Mexico? Give an outline of the fighting. Review the an¬ 
nexations of territory from 1783 to 1853. Which was the 
most costly? When did California come in? Why did the 
United States consent to divide the Oregon country with 
England ? 


292 SLAVERY AND TERRITORIAL EXPANSION 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That neither England nor the United States 
ought to have had Oregon, but that the Indians themselves 
should have been allowed to keep it. 

2. Resolved, That the Mexican War was unjust. 


Topics for Compositions 

1. Imagine yourself back in the times of the slavery agi¬ 
tation, and explain why you would or would not join the 
abolitionists. 

2. The excitement caused in the East by the discovery of 
gold in California. Sparks, Expansion, 336-350; Halsey, 
Epochs, VII, 88-96; Elson, Side Lights on American History, 
243-265. 

Topics for Further Study 


1. William Lloyd Garrison. McMaster, United States, VI, 
271-298. 

2. Actual Conditions of Slavery. Hart, Slavery and 
Abolition. 

Important Dates 


1820. Missouri Compromise. 
1845. Annexation of Texas. 
1846-1848. War with Mexico. 
1848. Gold in California. 


Books to Remember 


1. J. Royce, California. 


CHAPTER XVII 


GROWTH OF THE WEST. II 

COMMUNICATION AND TRANSPORTATION 

Introduction. — The problem before the country after 
the war with Mexico was how to consolidate the new 
acquisitions on the Pacific; how to build them up, and 
make them contented in the United States; and how to 
improve transportation facilities from the Atlantic to 
the Pacific. There were three ways to go to California 
and Oregon, (1) across Panama, (2) arooind Cape Horn, 
and (3) over the plains. 

Across Panama and Around Cape Horn. — The pass¬ 
age to the Pacific by way of the Isthmus of Panama in¬ 
volved a hard overland trip across fever-stricken tropi¬ 
cal swamps; but these perils were soon lightened by the 
construction of the present Panama Railroad, completed 
soon after 1850. To circumnavigate Cape Horn was 
no more difficult than any long voyage over the sea. 

Across the Plains. — By means of railroads, canal 
boats, and steamers on the rivers, it was easy enough 
to reach the Mississippi on the way to the Pacific from 
the east, but beyond the great waterway real hardships 
confronted the traveler. The great plains were hard 
to cross. 

(1) Leaving Lewis and Clark’s path in the north out 
of consideration as too difficult, many availed them- 

293 


294 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


selves of the old Oregon Trail, which was first marked 
out east of the Rockies by Long in 1820. This led west 
from Independence, Missouri, on the Missouri River, 
across the line of that state into Kansas. It then passed 
northward over the Kansas River to the Platte River, 
and along this river, past Fort Kearney and Fort Lar- 



The Trails to Oregon and California 


amie or} the North Fork of the Platte. The trail to 
Oregon then led to the South Pass in the Rockies, a 
pass twenty miles wide, thence along the Snake River 
to Walla AValla on the Columbia River, and down the 
Columbia to Oregon City. The distance covered was 
2040 miles from the starting place. The early settlers 







GROWTH OF THE WEST 


295 


of Oregon, the Mormons of Utah in 1847, and many of 
the gold-seekers of 1849 took this route. 

(2) The Great Salt Lake Trail was identical with 
the Oregon Trail as far the South Pass, whence it 
branched off southward to Great Salt Lake. 

(3) The Gold Seekers’ Trail followed the Great Salt 
Lake Trail to Great Salt Lake, whence it struck across 
the desert to California on the path first marked out bv 
Jedediah S. Smith. It is today the route of the Central 



L? . . .. Jr* 


i Ti 

, •• w- a* 

jl; v Ml 

~A - - • 

lS " 1 


Old Prairie Schooner and Stage Coach of First Days in the 

West 

Photograph taken of two ancient relics of early American 
pioneer life. Originals are at Sutter’s Fort in Sacramento, 
California, which is maintained as a museum by the Native 
Sons and Daughters of the Golden West. The stage coach is 
riddled with bullets through its encounters with the early out¬ 
laws and pioneer highwaymen. 


Pacific Railroad. Instead of crossing the desert west 
from Great Salt Lake, some rounded it on the south 
from Salt Lake City, and reached California through 














296 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


Walker’s Pass and a journey northward through the 
valley of the San Joaquin River. 

(4) As the result of Pike’s explorations of the upper 
courses of the Arkansas and Red Rivers at the begin¬ 
ning of the century, the Santa Fe Trail was laid out in 
1825 from Independence, Missouri, to Santa Fe, 800 
miles away, for the purpose of developing the overland 



Wagon Train Across the Plains 


trade through the southwest with Mexico. This was a 
very popular route after 1849 over Kansas and Col¬ 
orado to the Southwest. Over it Kearney’s cavalry, 
1,800 strong, proceeded to their bloodless capture of 
Santa Fe and New Mexico in the war with Mexico. In 
this long march Kearney’s men carried their bread in 
wagons, and for meat relied on the cattle which they 
drove along with their caravan. On their way the 




GROWTH OF THE WEST 


297 


soldiers passed the great commercial caravan which set 
out every year to the Southwest, consisting this year of 
404 wagons. The great Caravan, loaded chiefly with dry 
goods for the Mexican market, was scattered over the 
plains for miles. Today the trail is carefully marked 
by the Kansas Historical Society, and is followed more 
or less closely by the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe 
Railroad. Coronado may have followed the same path, 
three centuries in the past. 

(5) West from Santa Fe there were two trails leading 
to California. One was the old Spanish trail, and the 
other was traced by Kearney during the war with Mex¬ 
ico, on his way to California. 

The Great American Desert. — In 1820 Major Ste¬ 
phen H. Long, returning from an exploring expedition 
sent out by the national government, reported that the 
whole country drained by the Missouri, Arkansas, and 
Platte Rivers, and their tributaries, extending for five 
hundred miles between the Mississippi and the Rocky 
Mountains, was a desert of sand and stones, unfit for 
settlement. For the next fifty years this region was 
known as the Great American Desert. May it forever 
“ remain the unmolested haunt of the native hunter, 
and the jackals,” exclaimed one. It is “ the limit be¬ 
tween civilization and barbarism,” that “ seems to defy 
the industry of man,” said another. And still a third 
called it, “ a great wilderness — the Great American 
Desert — a scene of desolation scarcely equaled on the 
continent — a burned and arid desert.” The ridiculous 
myth which today brings a smile to the faces of all 
who know the civilization, the wealth, and the teeming 
millions of this section, actually retarded the settle¬ 
ment of the West. It made people in the east slow to 


298 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


interest themselves in a country like Oregon, which 
was believed to be, separated from eastern civilization by 
such a desolate country. It was a stumbling block in the 
way of the early advocates of building a railroad to the 
Pacific, in the days before California and Oregon be¬ 
longed to the United States. How could a railroad go 
over “ hopeless and sterile wastes? ” 

The Pacific Railroad. — The proposers of a Pacific 
Railway urged that such a road would carry immigrants 



The Completion of the Union Pacific And Central Pacific 

Railroads 


swiftly to their destination, build up new trade for the 
east with the Pacific coast and with China and Asia, 
and bind California and Oregon to the Union by firm ties 
of interest. But with the Southern States insisting upon 
a Southern Pacific Railroad, and the Northern States 




























GROWTH OF THE WEST 


299 


upon a Northern Pacific, it was impossible to agree 
upon a route; and the construction of the road was 
postponed for a number of years. 

The Road Completed. — In the year 1862, while the 
great Civil War was raging, Congress appropriated 
$50,000,000 in gold bonds and 2,000,000 acres of public 
lands to build the first Pacific road, the Union Pacific, 
which ran between Sacramento, California, and Omaha, 
Nebraska. When the eastern and western construction 
gangs came together at Odgen, Utah, holiday celebra¬ 
tions were held over the whole Union. A silver sledge 
hammer was used to drive the last three spikes, one of 
gold, silver ,and iron from Arizona, one of silver from 
Nevada, and one of gold from California. Connecting 
telegraph wires, which had anticipated the railroads 
by a few years in spanning the continent, reported the 
last strokes of these hammers in many of the leading 
cities. This was in 1867. 

The Pacific Telegraph and Pony Express. — The first 
telegraph to the Pacific went into operation in 1861 but 
attracted little public notice, since by that time war 
was overwhelming the land. The “ pony express,” which 
was a system of fast horsemen traveling in relays, 
started a year or so earlier to carry the mails over the 
plains to the Pacific till the advent of the railroads. 
The unique service covered the distance from St. Louis 
to San Francisco in ten days, amid countless dangers 
from the Indians, highway robbers, and storms. 

The Land Grant Railroads. — Before agreement was 
reached as to the Pacific railroad, Congress embarked 
on its “ land grant railroad policy,” by which in a few 
years’ time it disposed of over 20,000,000 acres of choice 
public lands in the interests of the western railroads. 


300 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


Among the first recipients of the unique bounty, which 
brought in thousands of dollars to the roads when they 
divided up the lands into farms and sold them to in¬ 
dividual settlers, were the Illinois Central Railroad and 
the Mobile and Ohio. These companies and others 
used the proceeds of the sales to build their roads. Con¬ 
gress also generously gave away to the states millions 


'1 

' \ 



Chicago in 1832 


of acres of “ swamp lands ” and “ saline lands,” to be 
used as the states might themselves direct, and other 
millions of acres to the veterans of the wars of the 
Lnited States. All these things Congress did to induce 
people to go to the West and settle. 

The Homestead Act. — At first the national govern¬ 
ment refused to give farms away to individuals for 
nothing, though this policy w T as urged upon it with great 
force, especially after the panic of 1837 had caused so 
many to lose their fortunes in the East. Then, in 1862, 
during the stress of the Civil War, Congress changed 





GROWTH OF THE WEST 


301 


its mind, and passed the celebrated Homestead Act, 
giving away farms of 160 acres each to bona fide set¬ 
tlers for a small fee to cover the expenses of preparing 
the lands for settlement. A more enlightened policy, 
from the point of view of building up the great West, 
could scarcely have been devised. The beneficent meas¬ 
ure is still on the statute books, though the area of 
land in the West still in the hands of the government is 
now comparatively small. 

New Gold and Silver Mines. — The mines of Cali¬ 
fornia had been producing their immense treasures for 
ten years, when the discovery of other rich mines, the 
Gregory lode of gold in Colorado, and in Nevada the 
Comstock lode of gold and silver, turned the tide of 
immigration in new directions. The town of Denver, 
Colorado, now made its appearance on the map, and 
11 Pike’s Peak or bust ” became a new rallying cry for 
the prairie schooners on the western plains. 

The Mormons. — After the settlers of Oregon and Cal¬ 
ifornia, the Mormons were the next large band of em¬ 
igrants to go over the plains. These people belonged 
to a religious sect that made its appearance with the 
publication of Joseph Smith’s Book of Mormon in 1830. 
This book, which contained the writings of a certain 
prophet, Mormon by name, was supposed to have been 
“ revealed ” to Smith, and it was regarded as sacred 
by his followers. The profession of divine origin, and 
the early practice of polygamy brought great persecu¬ 
tions upon Smith and his followers. Driven successively 
from Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois, where Smith was 
murdered by a mob, the 11 faithful ” finally took up the 
Oregon trail to the Great South Pass. From this point 
they blazed a new path southward to Great Salt Lake, 


302 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


that they might be alone in the wilderness. This was 
the beginning of the Great Salt Lake Trail, and, as far 
as it went, of the Gold Seekers’ Trail to California. 
The Mormons succeeded in making the desert blossom 
like the rose. Their chief city, Salt Lake City, became 
an important stopping-off place on the overland journey 
to California. 

Petroleum in Pennsylvania. — Not all who were seek¬ 
ing new homes and new adventures, in the middle of 
the nineteenth centurv, were attracted to the far West. 
Many went into northwestern Pennsylvania, near Lake 
Erie, where petroleum or crude oil was discovered in 
paying quantities just before 1860. The oil had to be 
pumped from the first wells that were dug, but soon a 
well was struck which flowed of itself for fifteen months, 
at the rate of 250 barrels, worth $10,000, per day. 
There were many such sensations. Oil City, Franklin, 
Titusville and other towns sprang up in the wilderness 
as if by magic. Thus was laid the foundation of the 
Rockefeller fortune, the largest private fortune in the 
world. 

FARM LIFE AND FACTORY LIFE IN THE MIDDLE 
OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 

New Inventions on the Farms. — The changes to the 
modern labor-saving agricultural machinery from the 
crude tools of the older days, when the primeval forests 
were cleared and the prairies of the interior first grubbed 
and plowed, began on a small scale during the first 
quarter of the nineteenth century. Modern edge tools, 
axes, hatchets, and chisels then came slowly into use; 
iron and steel plows drove out the old wooden plow; 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


303 


the simple and useful revolving hay rake appeared; 
mowing machines displaced hand scythes; and the first 
grain drills and cultivators were put on the market. So 
conservative were the farmers, at first, so accustomed 
were they to the old ways, and so slow was the progress 
of the manufacture of the new tools and machinery, 
that these contrivances were not in common use as late 
as 1850. They did not come into general use till the 
great Civil War called men from the farms to the field 
of battle. Then labor-saving devices became abso¬ 
lutely necessary on the farms which the men had left 
behind. 



The Original McCormick Reaper 


Obed Hussey and Cyrus H. McCormick. — In 1833 

Obed Hussey took out a patent in Virginia for the 
reaping machine, which was to prove as epoch-making, 
in the history of American agriculture, as Whitney’s 











304 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


cotton gin. In the next year came Cyrus H. McCor¬ 
mick’s reaper. Endowed with great foresight and with 
tireless energy, McCormick went to the West, first to 
Cincinnati and then to Chicago which he recognized 
as the coming center of the grain-raising sections of the 
country. There, in the middle of the century, he started 
to build the present mammoth McCormick reaper works. 
The first reapers let the grain fall where it was cut, 
and then, step by step, improvements were made. First 
a carrying-board was added, from which the grain was 
raked bv hand at intervals; the machine was next 
changed so that it raked the grain off this board auto¬ 
matically; by a binding attachment the grain was bound 
and tied into sheaves at first by wire and then by twine, 
before falling to the ground. Then came separate 
threshing machines, run at first by horse-power and then 
by steam, which threshed, cleaned, and measured the 
grain, and stacked the straw in one operation. The 
triumph of the grain farm seems to be reached in the 
present giant machines, run either by horse-power or by 
traction engines, which combine the modern reapers and 
threshers in one, cutting, cleaning, and threshing at one 
operation. 

Cattle Ranches. — On the treeless prairies of the West 
a peculiar form of agricultural effort, the cattle ranch, 
made its appearance from Mexico just before the middle 
of the century. It was supplied at first by Mexican and 
later by “ Texas steers.” Cattle had been raised by the 
American farmer on the frontier from the beginning, but 
always on a small scale, until the two elements, the 
great supply of free grass on the prairies of the West 
and the valuable Texas cattle, combined to create the 
new ranch. This was unique in the annals of farming. 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 


305 


The ranch was not limited to a few hundred acres, and 
it was not a stationary thing, like the homestead and 
the farm of the ordinary settler. Nor was it encum¬ 
bered with bars and fences. Branded with marks which 
were usually respected as a full and complete title to 
ownership, the cattle roamed free over the loosely de¬ 
fined ranges hundreds of miles in extent. At the “ round¬ 
up,” which was “ the harvest time of the range,” the 
cowboys with their ponies searched out the wandering 
herds, gathered them together, and took them on the 
long drive to market; sometimes to St. Louis, sometimes 
to Kansas City, but mainly to Chicago. At the time of 
the drives the long trails were dotted for hundreds of 
miles with herds of from five to ten thousand cattle, all 
northward going. 

Factory Towns. — Under the domestic system of man¬ 
ufacture, which existed during the colonial period, men 
worked alone in their scattered and isolated homes. 
From this was evolved the factory system, under which 
the many workers came together for common effort 
under one roof. With the use of water power and then 
wdth the use of the power of steam, guided and applied 
by man, the output of manufactured articles was mar¬ 
velously increased. The concentration of the artisans in 
“ factory ” towns created a new social class, with needs 
of its own, different from those of any other class. To 
meet these needs the owners of factories sometimes 
erected boarding-houses for their employees, and some¬ 
times schools and churches; and they provided company 
stores, where the workers might purchase needed house¬ 
hold supplies. Despite these measures, disputes between 
laborers and employers over wages, hours, pickets, and 
scabs, were quick to come. As early as the presidency of 


306 


GROWTH OF THE WEST 



A Factory Town in 1838 (Lowell, Mass.) 















GROWTH OF THE WEST 307 

Andrew Jackson, labor unions and strikes were common 
in the factories of America. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. What new problems in statesmanship were thrust upon 
the country by the Mexican War? Why was it desirable to 
get new ways of communication and transportation between 
the Atlantic coast and the Pacific coast? What ways were 
used? What were the most popular? What great mistake 
was made seventy-five years ago about the nature of the 
country between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Moun¬ 
tains? Name all the difficulties you can that made it hard 
to induce Congress to favor a railroad to the Pacific. What 
was the Pony Express? What was a land grant railroad? 
Why was the Homestead Act famous? What have the Mor¬ 
mons done for the United States? 

2. Name the new inventions that came into use on the 
farms in the first part of the nineteenth century. What 
was the effect of the Civil War on the use of labor-saving 
machinery on the farms? What did Cyrus H. McCormick do 
for the farms of the country? Describe a cattle ranch; a 
factory town. 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That Cyrus H. McCormick has done more 
for the people of the United States than Eli Whitney. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. The Union Pacific Railroad. Halsey, Epochs, IX, 122— 
130; Sparks, Expansion, 366-375. 

2. The Cattle Ranch. Hough, Story of the Cowboy. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The Great American Desert. Early Western Travels , 
see Index. 

Important Dates 

1861. Telegraph overland to the Pacific. 

1862. Homestead Act. 

1867. Union Pacific Railroad. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


QUARRELS OVER SLAVERY IN THE 

TERRITORIES 

THE COMPROMISE OF 1850 

Zachary Taylor. — In the presidential contest of 1848, 
following the treaty of peace with Mexico, the Whigs 
came into power a second time, but with the same ill 
luck that had attended them after the election of Gen¬ 
eral Harrison. The new President, General Zachary 
Taylor, commander of the American armies during the 
first invasion of Mexico from Texas, died suddenly after 
a little more than a year in office. He was succeeded 
by Vice-President Millard Fillmore of New York. 

Plans for Controlling Slavery in the Territories. — 
Everyone who had appreciated the rivalry of the South 
and the North over new states, saw, even before the 
Mexican War ended, that the annexation of any territory 
from Mexico would bring on another political quarrel' 
in Congress over whether or not to allow slavery in the 
new acquisition. Texas had been admitted as a slave 
state, without very much question, since she had had 
slavery while an independent republic; but what to do 
with slavery in any other territory that Mexico might 
surrender, was not so easilv decided. 

Four Plans.— (1) Some, led by David Wilmot of 
Pennsylvania, favored forbidding slavery in the terri¬ 
tory to be acquired from Mexico, according to the plan 

308 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


309 


Congress had followed for the “ Northwest Territory ” 
and that adopted in the Missouri Compromise of 1820 
for the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase. 

(2) Others, led by Calhoun of South Carolina, the 
leader of the nullification forces of 1832, took the op- 



John C. Calhoun 


posite view, and favored allowing slavery in the 
territory. 

(3) Compromise of the whole question, upon terms 
to be agreed upon, was still another solution. This 
would mean something gained and something lost by 
each side. 










310 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


(4) A strong group in both North and South brought 
forward the principle of “ squatter sovereignty,” that 
the “ squatters,” that is, the settlers of the territory, 
themselves should make the decision one wav or the 
other, for or against slavery, as they themselves thought 
best. 

The Compromise of 1850. — After one of the most 
memorable debates in Congress, Henry Clay of Ken- 



Henry Clay 


tueky introduced a plan which he succeeded in getting 
through Congress. Clay had been a leading spirit in 
securing compromise on difficult questions in politics 
on two other occasions, first when Missouri was ad¬ 
mitted to the Union in 1820, and second, when the 





SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


311 


Compromise Tariff Law of 1832 was passed. His plan, 
the Compromise of 1850, was as follows: 

(1) California was to be a free state, as she herself 
had requested. The growth of the gold country in two 
years had been phenomenal. It was estimated that one 
hundred thousand people went to the diggings in 1849, 
and that in the first two years of the mines $45,000,000 
worth of gold had been obtained. The production of 
the mines was destined to be heavier still in the next 
few years. That this richest part of the new territory 
should be dedicated to freedom was a great concession 
to the North and a very hard blow to the South. 

(2) As a concession to the South, but a correspond¬ 
ingly hard blow to the North, Congress enacted a strict 
fugitive slave law. 

(3) The people of the eastern part of the land just 
annexed from Mexico were organized into the new ter¬ 
ritories of Utah and New Mexico. There was no spe¬ 
cific decision by Congress on the question of slavery in 
these territories. 

(4) The slave trade, the buying and selling of slaves, 
was prohibited in the District of Columbia. 

(5) Texas was paid $10,000,000 for giving up to the 
United States her claim to certain lands, which were 
added to New Mexico. 

The Fugitive Slave Law. — Under the practical 
working of the Fugitive Slave Law the Northern States 
were kept in a continual turmoil. Exciting arrests 
and thrilling rescues startled the country. Instead of 
depending upon local officials to help a slave-holder to 
find and arrest his runawav slaves in the North, the new 
law placed this duty on national officials, who became 
noted for their strictness. Said one Northern leader, 


312 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


“ I have no more hesitation in helping a fugitive slave 
than I have in snatching a lamb from the jaws of a 
wolf, or of disentangling an infant from the talons of 
an eagle.” This sentiment was widespread, and in the 
face of it enforcement of the law was difficult. 

The Underground Railroad. — By stealthy means, 
popularly known as the underground railroad, the ene¬ 
mies of slavery did much to outwit the law. Thousands 
of blacks, escaping chiefly through Pennsylvania and 
Ohio, were helped from town to town to safety in 
Canada, where they were free. By day these fugitives 
slept in garrets, barns, and other hiding-places; and were 
guided on their way by night by the light of the friendly 
stars. Some states, like Vermont, passed Personal 
Liberty Laws, denying to the national officials the use of 
state jails for detaining the slaves, giving to the latter 
jury trials, etc.; and thus making it as difficult as pos¬ 
sible to enforce the Fugitive Slave Law. 

Uncle Tom’s Cabin. — Stirred to the very depths of 
her deeply religious soul by the stories of the captures 
and escapes of the fugitive blacks that filled every part 
of the land, Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1852 published 
her great story, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. It is no exagger¬ 
ation to say that no other printed book ever agitated 
the American public as did this one. It discussed the 
moral aspects of slavery from the anti-slavery point 
of view, and was thoroughly one-sided. One hundred 
thousand copies of it were sold within a few weeks, 
and three hundred thousand copies in the first year. 
In the youth of the land, who shed tears at the 
death of Uncle Tom, it aroused strong sympathy for the 
slaves and prepared the way for them to cast anti¬ 
slavery votes in the next decade. 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


313 


THE KANSAS-NEBRASKA ACT AND THE DRED 

SCOTT DECISION 

Franklin Pierce. — The next President was Franklin 
Pierce, a Democrat, who won a handsome victory in the 
presidential contest of 1852. 

The Kansas Nebraska Act of 1854. — The day of 
compromise on the slavery question was past. For 
the next decade national legislation concerning slavery 
was to be strongly in favor of the South. In the year 



Stephen A. Douglas 


1854, under the leadership of Stephen A. Douglas, Con¬ 
gress took a very bold step. By the Kansas-Nebraska 
Act, it repealed the Missouri Compromise Act of 1820. 
which had prohibited slavery in the territory north of 
36° 30' North Latitude, the southern line of Missouri, 







314 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


and gave slavery another chance there. The people of 
the two new territories of Kansas and Nebraska were 
to decide for themselves for or against slavery in their 
respective territories, as they themselves desired, by 
“ squatter sovereignty.’’ 

The Republican Party. — Political excitement w r as at 
fever heat. Douglas was bitterly denounced as a trai¬ 
tor to the solemn agreement of 1820. It is an index of 
the widespread dissatisfaction that out of it all came 
the Republican party. Opponents of slavery, friends of 
the Compromise of 1820, favorable to keeping slavery 
out of the territories, united in the new organization. 
The name Republican was first adopted by a state con¬ 
vention in Michigan, in the summer shortly after the law 
went into effect. The first Republican national nomi¬ 
nating convention was held in 1856, when John C. 
Fremont was named as the standard-bearer. 

“Bleeding Kansas. ,, —Within two years it was ap¬ 
parent what squatter sovereignty would do for Kansas. 
It brought, not peace, but the sword. There was bitter 
civil war between pro-slavery men from Missouri, who 
settled at Atchison, Leavenworth and Lecompton, and 
the anti-slavery men from New England, who founded 
Topeka, Lawrence, and other towns. The former wished 
to control Kansas and bring it into the Union as a 
slave state. To this end they framed a state constitu¬ 
tion, allowing slavery, while the anti-slavery men 
framed a free constitution. Congress, though stirred by 
fierce debate on the subject, turned a deaf ear to both 
parties, and declined to let Kansas into the Union at 
all. It remained a territory till 1861, when it entered as 
a free state, under an anti-slavery constitution. 

The Dred Scott Decision. — In 1857, a few days after 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


315 


the next President, James Buchanan, a Democrat, took 
his seat, the Supreme Court of the United States ren¬ 
dered a decision that had great influence on the all- 
important question of territorial slavery. There was 
in Missouri a slave named Dred Scott, who had lived 
previously in the territory of Minnesota, which had been 
dedicated to freedom by the Missouri Compromise of 
1820. He claimed his freedom in the courts on the 
ground that residence in free territory made him free. 
The Supreme Court decided against Scott on the ground 
that as a slave he did not have the right to bring suit in 
the courts, because he was not a citizen. It went far 
out of its way to declare that residence in Minnesota 
could not free him, because Congress, which declared 
Minnesota free territory by the Missouri Compromise 
Act of 1820, had had no right to do so. According to 
this decision, the Constitution, which was of course 
above Congress, required that property be protected in 
all territories. Slaves were considered property. By 
this startling judgment, the court thus decided the terri¬ 
torial question in favor of slavery. The decision 
seemed to threaten even the free states, inasmuch as 
the same Constitution which decreed that the terri¬ 
tories should protect property, must logically have the 
same pro-slavery meaning in all the states. By this 
line of reasoning even the states that thought that they 
were free, were not free at all. The South was greatly 
pleased that the long standing question was being de¬ 
cided in its favor. On the other hand, the North was 
aghast, expecting that the court would soon deliver an¬ 
other decision, that would follow out the logical conse¬ 
quences of the Dred Scott Decision, and place slavery 
definitely in the free states. 


316 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


The Lincoln-Douglas Debates. — Shortly following 
this, there was a series of notablo debates between 
Abraham Lincoln, who sought to be United States 
Senator from Illinois, and Stephen A. Douglas, then 
Senator, who was seeking re-election. In the course 
of the debate Lincoln asked Douglas, who was a Dem¬ 
ocrat, to reconcile his Kansas-Nebraska Act with the 
Dred Scott Decision. If slavery went into the terri¬ 
tories with the Constitution, how, Lincoln queried, 
could the people of the territory, under the popular 
sovereignty principle of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, exer¬ 
cise their popular sovereignty and vote it out. Lincoln 
was trying to show that the Supreme Court, in deciding 
Dred Scott’s case, had really decided against Douglas’s 
doctrine of popular sovereignty. Douglas dodged the 
question, saying that even if the Constitution put 
slavery in the territories, the people of a territory could 
enact “ unfriendly legislation ” in their territorial legis¬ 
lature and thus make it so uncomfortable for slave¬ 
holders that they would not remain in the territory with 
their slaves. Lincoln was, of course, opposed to the 
Dred Scott Decision, and asked the question to discredit 
his rival. This he certainly accomplished, for Douglas’s 
doctrine of “ unfriendly legislation,” which seemed to 
weaken the Dred Scott Decision, caused him to lose 
friends in the South. Douglas won the Senatorial elec¬ 
tion in Illinois, but Lincoln, who preached.the doctrine 
that Congress should step in and follow the example of 
the Northwest Ordinance and the Missouri Compromise 
and forbid slavery in the remaining territories of the 
United States, began to be talked of outside of Illinois 
as a clear and forceful champion of anti-slavery. 

John Brown’s Raid. — Greater excitement has seldom 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


317 


stirred the nation, both North and South, than that 
which flamed forth when it was announced one Monday 
morning in October, 1859, that on the previous Sunday 
night a band of abolitionists, led by John Brown, an 
anti-slavery leader of Kansas, had started an insurrec¬ 
tion of slaves at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia. Several of 
the raiders and one or two of the inhabitants of the 
town were killed. Brown was wounded and, with some 
of his companions, was captured, the rest of his party 
was dispersed, while not a slave left his master. Brown’s 
ominous words, as he lay on his bed of pain awaiting 
trial, went to the heart of the nation: “ I hold that the 
Golden Rule, ‘ Do unto others as you would that others 
should do unto you,L applies to all that would help 
others to gain their liberty. ... I want you to under¬ 
stand that I respect the rights of the poorest and weak¬ 
est of the colored people oppressed by the slavery sys¬ 
tem, just as much as I do those of the most wealthy and 
powerful. ... I wish to say, furthermore, that you had 
better, all you people at the South, prepare yourselves 
for a settlement of this question sooner than you are 
prepared for it. The sooner that you are prepared, the 
better. You may dispose of me very easily. I am 
nearly disposed of now; but this question is still to be 
settled, this negro question, I mean; the end of that 
is not yet.” 

Arguments against Slavery. — John Brown was 
hanged by the state of Virginia for treason and murder, 
but his soul went “ marching on.” Never had the pop¬ 
ular discussion of the slavery question been so wide¬ 
spread. Its opponents held up the revolting features 
of the system, the harsh punishments of the offending 
slaves, the unfeeling separation of families at the slave 


318 SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 

auction, the cruel hunt for the run-aways. The hard¬ 
ships and illegal aspects of the foreign slave trade were 
also brought to mind, for although this trade had been 
prohibited by law in 1819 it still went on. An influen¬ 
tial book appeared, called The Impending Crisis. How 
to Meet It, which showed by comparisons how slavery 
had impeded the prosperity of the South, while the 
North had rapidly forged ahead in the volume of mining 
and manufacturing products, in that of foreign imports 
and exports, and in population. 

Arguments for Slavery. — The Southerners empha¬ 
sized the fairer sides of slavery, showing how the system 
rescued the Africans from the darkest barbarism of their 
benighted home-land, civilized and Christianized them, 
cared for them, and in general rendered them satisfied; 
how the slaves by their training acquired habits of 
thrift and industry, though by nature they were prone 
to laziness; how the Bible, in the New Testament, en¬ 
joined upon all slaves obedience to their masters; and 
how the whole economic life of the South, the cultiva¬ 
tion of the immense crops of tobacco, sugar and cotton, 
was bound up with the slave system. It was empha¬ 
sized that cotton exports were one-third of the total 
exports of the nation, and the question was asked, where 
would the cotton crop be, without the work of negro 
slaves? 

The Presidential Nominations of 1860. — Swayed by 
the undying debate over slavery, the people again 
faced the necessity of more discussion of the questions 
that agitated them, for they must come together in their 
presidential campaign, talk over their national policies, 
and name the Chief Magistrate for the next four years. 
In this campaign of 1860 there appeared the ultimate 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


319 


result of that shrewd question on the Dred Scott Deci¬ 
sion that Lincoln had asked Douglas during the Sena¬ 
torial debates in Illinois two years back. The Demo¬ 
crats were hopelessly divided between the squatter sov¬ 
ereignty faction that nominated Douglas, and the Dred 
Scott faction that rejected Douglas, their leader of 1854, 
as a turncoat, and nominated Breckinridge. The united 
and enthusiastic Republicans named Lincoln, Douglas’s 
old opponent. 

Lincoln’s Position. — Lincoln was not an abolitionist 
by any means, but was known as a strong opponent of 
the Compromise of 1850, the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and 
the Dred Scott Decision. His speeches showed that he 
believed in the prohibition of slavery in the territories 
by act of Congress. He believed also that “ a house 
divided against itself cannot stand,” and that the 
United States would some day become all free or all 
slave. Yet he was not an extremist, and did not have 
so many enemies as the more prominent Republican 
leader, William H. Seward of New York. It was es¬ 
pecially important in this campaign, in which the South 
was bound to oppose the North, to win to the Republi¬ 
can cause the moderate pro-slavery people of southern 
Ohio, southern Indiana, and southern Illinois, whom 
Seward had alienated by his strong doctrines. Lincoln 
could appeal to these people, whereas Seward could not. 

Arguments for and against Secession. — The one big 
issue in the campaign was the Southern threat that that 
section would secede from the Union in case Lincoln 
were elected. The Southerners argued that the success 
of Lincoln, wdth his u house divided against itself ” doc¬ 
trine, would lead to more opposition to the Dred Scott 
Decision, to more attempts to exclude slavery from the 


320 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


territories, and to more John Brown raids. Rather than 
endanger the great crops of the South, and run the risk 
of a social upheaval, which might result from the at¬ 
tacks upon slavery, the people of the Southern states 
preferred to get out of the Union entirely. They con¬ 
tended, too, that secession was the logical sequence of 
the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions. The Northern¬ 
ers pointed out to their Southern brethren that seces¬ 
sion would surely lead to war, since any vigorous 
President, backed by self-respecting patriotic citizens, 
would be morally bound to attempt to prevent the 
break-up of the Union and the Constitution, which he 
had sworn “ to preserve, protect, and defend.” Seces¬ 
sion, they showed, was not a safe foundation on which 
to found a state, since any new state, thus founded, 
might itself in turn suffer from the very doctrine that 
had brought it into existence. Moreover, what right 
had Louisiana and Florida to secede, brought into the 
Union by the common treasure? What right had Texas, 
secured by the blood of the soldiers of every state? 

Other Issues. — The Republican platform appealed 
to the sentiment of the coal and iron state of Pennsyl¬ 
vania in favor of high protective tariffs, by declaring for 
a protective tariff. This was good politics, as the Penn¬ 
sylvanians at that time were smarting under the reduc¬ 
tions of the tariff made by the Democratic Congress 
in 1857. Advocates of cheap farms for all comers, on 
the public lands of the West, were attracted by the 
Republican declaration in favor of a homestead law, 
similar to that which was finally passed. 

Lincoln and the Republicans won an overwhelming 
victory. 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


321 


THE CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA 

Secession Carried Out. — The South did not yield 
when the election of Lincoln was announced, but imme¬ 
diately proceeded to carry out its threat. As in 1832 
in the less serious controversy with the central govern¬ 
ment over the tariff and nullification, South Carolina 
led the way out of the Union. It was followed in order, 
before the inauguration of Lincoln, by Mississippi, 
Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas. 
South Carolina’s brief ordinance of secession made the 
simple declaration that its ratification of the Consti¬ 
tution of the United States in 1787 was repealed, and 
that the union between her and the other states was 
dissolved. 

The Confederate States of America. — The first 
seven states to secede sent delegates to Montgomery, 
Alabama, and agreed upon first a provisional and then 
a permanent Constitution of the Confederate States of 
America, with Jefferson Davis of Mississippi as Presi¬ 
dent. The new Constitution legalized slavery in the 
states and territories, and adopted the doctrines of strict 
construction and states’ rights, but did not mention 
those of nullification and secession. The President 
was to have a single term of six years, and the mem¬ 
bers of his cabinet were to have the right to sit on 
the floors of both houses of Congress, but not to vote. 
The central government was given the definite right 
to annex territory. In all other respects the Confed¬ 
erate Constitution very closely resembled the Consti¬ 
tution of the LTiited States. 

James Buchanan. — Four Northerners stood forth in 


322 


SLAVERY IN THE .TERRITORIES 


the crisis, the respective leaders of four different pro¬ 
grams offered to the American people. President Bu¬ 
chanan argued, valiantly against the right of secession, 
but, timid and even tearful, refused, although com¬ 
mander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United 



James Buchanan 


States, to take any steps to prevent it. Never was a 
President more glad to lay down the reins of office than 
was he on March 4, 1861. 

Horace Greeley. — Horace Greeley, the editor of the 
very widely circulated newspaper, the New York Trib¬ 
une, argued that the best thing to do was to let “ the 
erring sisters go in peace.” 

John J. Crittenden. — Henry Clay’s successor in the 
United States Senate from Kentucky, John J. Critten¬ 
den, brought forth a policy of compromise, which had 
a great many followers in all parts of the country, 
particularly among the Democrats. He proposed in 








SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


323 


the Senate (1) that the Missouri Compromise line of 
36° 30', North Latitude, be extended to California, and 
that all territory north of this be free and all south of it 
be slave; (2) that the LTnited States government pay 
for all fugitive slaves lost in the Northern States; and 
(3) that the United States formally renounce the right 
to interfere with slavery in the states. The last of 
these propositions was adopted by Congress as an 
amendment to the Constitution, but was not ratified by 
two-thirds of the states. 



Abraham Lincoln 

Abraham Lincoln. — Lincoln, as leader of the new 
and triumphant Republican party, took upon himself 
the terrible responsibility of rejecting all proposals of 
compromise. He did not think that a new party, upon 




324 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 


going into office, should desert the very principles that 
gave it birth. “ Entertain no proposition for a com¬ 
promise in regard to the extension of slavery. The 
instant you do they have us under again; all our labor 
is lost, and sooner or later must be done over again. 
. . . Have none of it. The tug has to come, and better 
now than later.” 



Jefferson Davis 


In general the Republicans urged a firm stand in 
Washington in favor of the Union. “ Oh, for an hour 
of Andrew Jackson! ” they sighed while Buchanan was 
in the presidential chair, as they recalled Old Hickory’s 
stand against nullification in 1832. What their new 
President would do against secession, when he came 
into office, was a burning question. 

Jefferson Davis. — On the Southern side, President 




SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 325 

Jefferson Davis maintained the position of his section 
with equal firmness. Surely no two men ever took 
upon themselves greater responsibility than did Abra¬ 
ham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. How did the addition of new territory to the United 
States in 1848 immediately bring the subject of slavery into 
national politics? What were the five parts of the Com¬ 
promise of 1850? Explain the Fugitive Slave Law. Why 
did some people object to it? What was the Underground 
Railroad? Who wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin? Why did this 
book so stir the North? Why did the Southern people con¬ 
demn the book? 

2. Who was the author of the Kansas-Nebraska Act? How 

did this law affect Kansas and Nebraska? What was the 
position of the new Republican party, which arose at this 

time? Explain the term, “Bleeding Kansas.” Tell all you 

can about Dred Scott, and what the Supreme Court said 
about his rights? In the Lincoln-Douglas debates what did 
each champion stand for? What did John Brown do to dis¬ 
turb the peace of the country? Who were Lincoln’s two 
opponents in the election of 1860? What is secession? Can 
you explain why the southern states believed that they had 

the right to secede? Why did they desire to secede at this 

time ? 

3. What state started secession? What previous difficulty 
had this state had with the national government? What 
did President Buchanan do about secession? What did 
Horace Greeley think? Senator Crittenden? Abraham Lin¬ 
coln? Jefferson Davis? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the Fugitive Slave Law was just. 

2. Resolved, That the Kansas-Nebraska Act was fair to 
both North and South. 


326 


SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES 
Topics for Compositions 


1. The Lincoln-Douglas Debates. Rhodes, United States, 
II, 320-338; Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln, II, 135- 
170; Elson, Side Lights on American History, 310-339. 

2. John Brown’s Raid and its Results. Halsey, Epochs, 
VII, 177-194; Fite, Presidential Campaign of 1860, 1-32; 
Hart, Romance of the Civil War, 71. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Life of Abraham Lincoln to 1860. Various Lives of 
Lincoln; Dana, Makers of America, 139; Roosevelt and 
Others, Stories of the Republic, 206. 

2. The Underground Railroad. Halsey, Epochs, VII, 110— 
115; Siebert, Underground Railroad; Rhodes, United States, 
II, 74-77; Elson, Side Lights on American History, 265-295; 
Hart, Romance of the Civil War, 51-117. 

Important Dates 

1850. Compromise of 1850. Fugitive Slave Law. 

1854. Kansas-Nebraska Act. 

1859. John Brown’s Raid. 

1860. Election of Lincoln. 

Books to Remember 

1. J. F. Rhodes, United States. 

2. Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln. 

3. O. G. Villard, John Brown . 










I 



































HOOT 
















































































CHAPTER XIX 


THE CIVIL WAR 

THE FIRST YEAR, 1861 

Lincoln’s Firmness. — The new President took the 
very first opportunity to reaffirm officially, in his in¬ 
augural address, what he had already said and written 
informally before inauguration. His stand against 
compromise remained unchanged. He would not use 
force against the Southern States, he said, if they 
obeyed the law; but he would defend the forts and 
other property of the Emited States, and would collect 
the tariff. 

Fort Sumter. — Very soon the question pressed home 
upon the President what to do with Fort Sumter in the 
harbor of Charleston, South Carolina. Here, in the 
very heart of the enemy’s country, the Stars and Stripes 
were still flying; and here, with the tension between the 
sections growing every hour, the least thing was liable 
to bring on a clash. Food supplies in the fort were 
getting low, and when a ship with the needed supplies, 
sent by order of President Lincoln, appeared in the 
harbor, the crisis came. Under orders from their Pres¬ 
ident, Jefferson Davis, the Southerners, on Friday, April 
12, 1861, from the surrounding forts opened fire on 
Sumter to reduce it before the supplies could be un¬ 
loaded. 


327 


328 


THE CIVIL WAR 


The Bombardment. — Fort Sumter was an uncom¬ 
pleted brick fort, forty feet high and eight feet thick, 
built on an artificial island three miles from Charles¬ 
ton, and pierced for 140 guns, of which only 48 were 
mounted and ready for use. Although the Confederate 



Fort Sumter and Charleston Harbor 


artillery was about equal to the number of guns manned 
by Major Anderson and his garrison of 128 men, the 
fierce duel of thirty hours was all to the advantage of 
the Confederates, since their guns could concentrate fire 
on one point, while Anderson had to diffuse his shots, 
aiming now at one enemy battery and now at another. 
Also the Southerners had some 10 inch mortars, which 
could drop large shells into the fort from above, while all 











329 


THE CIVIL WAR 

the Northern fire was horizontal, directed straight against 
the face of bomb-proof earthworks and batteries which 
were protected by sandbags and sloping railroad iron. 
Because of the lack of men and the slowly fail¬ 
ing supply of cartridges, the Union commander gradu¬ 
ally abandoned his few active guns, until at the end 
the unequal contest was fought out between the con¬ 
centrated fire of 50 Confederate guns and the scattered 
fire of 6 Union guns. The surrender was brought about 
not so much by the direct shots of the Southern bat¬ 
teries as by the fires which their shells kindled in the 
wooden buildings within the fort. Powder had to be 
thrown into the bay to avoid an explosion. 

On Sunday, April 14, Major Anderson and his brave 
men were allowed to give a last salute to their flag, 
to march out of their fort with all the honors of war, 
and to sail away to New York. 

The War Begun. — No blood was shed in this first 
encounter, but the war was begun. The terrible news 
was announced in many places in the North in the Sun¬ 
day morning church services; some had heard of it on 
the previous Saturday; and on Monday morning came 
President Lincoln’s call for 75,000 troops. The dread¬ 
ful excitement that swept over both sections of the 
country can now be but faintly realized. To avenge 
the insult to the flag, in the North, and in the South 
to defend the newly assumed right of self-government, 
Northern and Southern patriots rushed off to the wars 
in the fiercest, maddest passion that America had ever 
seen. 

Secession Completed. — In the excitement, Virginia, 
which had remained undecided down to this time, threw 


Stanton Lincoln Seward 

President Lincoln and his Cabinet Discussing the Emancipation Proclamation 



Chase Welles Smith Blair 




THE CIVIL WAR 


331 


in its lot with the Confederacy. She was quickly fol¬ 
lowed by the other waverers, Arkansas, North Caro¬ 
lina, and Tennessee. It was said at the time that one 
of the reasons why Jefferson Davis took the bold step 
of firing on the flag of the United States was his hope 
that in the resulting excitement the Border Slave States 
would be swept off their feet, over to his side. He was 
warned that by the same course his cause would lose 
all its friends in the Northern States, but he was 
willing to let this come about, preferring to get power¬ 
ful Virginia and the other Border States on his side, 
and then fight. It was said in the North that Lincoln, 
by sending the provision ship to Sumter, had very 
shrewdly forced his opponent into taking the unpop¬ 
ular stand of opening fire on the flag, knowing that such 
an attack would unite the North as nothing else could. 
Party strife was forgotten in the great crisis. Even 
Lincoln’s old rival, Douglas, went to the White House 
to assure the President of ardent support from himself 
and his followers. 

Leading Domestic Problems. — Military operations 
were immediately planned and initiated along several 
lines. 

(a) Washington. — The first bloodshed came on April 
19, when Massachusetts troops, on the way to Washing¬ 
ton to render the capital safe, were fired upon by a 
mob in Baltimore, Maryland. Several lives were lost. 
The North’s immediate military problem was to pro¬ 
tect its capital city. 

( b ) Richmond. — In the development of this policy 
the next effort of Lincoln was naturally to push on to the 
Confederate capital. “ On to Richmond! ” became the 
North’s great rallying cry, which, however, it was to 


332 


THE CIVIL WAR 


take four years to realize. The first considerable battle 
of the war took place in pursuance of this policy oi 
trying to capture Richmond. It was fought on July 
21, at Manassas Junction on a small stream in Vir¬ 
ginia, called Bull Run, about thirty miles from Wash¬ 
ington. The Unionists were badly defeated. General 



McClellan, who took charge of the Union troops after 
the battle, was so much impressed by the seriousness 
of the problem before him that he spent the next eight 
or nine months in doing nothing but drill the men and 
prepare them for their ordeal. 

(c) Holding the Border States to Loyalty. — When 
he was forced, after the surrender of Fort Sumter, to see 
the middle tier of slave states join his enemies, Lincoln 













THE CIVIL WAR 


333 



tier of Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri in the 
Union. He succeeded, though it took some bitter fight- 






























334 


THE CIVIL V7AR 


ing in Missouri. The ever-present danger of driving 
these states into joining the South exercised a strong 
influence over the President to the very end of the 
war. It held him back from going too fast and too 
far in his measures against slavery. 

( d) Gaining Possession of the Mississippi. — Little 
was done in the first year in working out this fourth 
problem of the North, the military control of the 
Mississippi. The object was to cut the Confederacy 
in two, and from the great interior river ascend its 
tributaries into the heart of the enemy’s country. 

( e ) Invasion of the South. — Likewise little was 
accomplished in this first year of preparation, in work¬ 
ing toward a solution of the great problem of how to 
invade the South overland from the North. The en¬ 
tire southern line west from Virginia to the Mississippi 
had to be rolled back. 

(/) The Blockade. — The Confederacy must also be 
cut off from all access to the outside world by water. 
To effect this, the President set the navy to the huge 
task of patrolling the entire coast line of thousands of 
miles so far as this was possible, and watching every 
Southern port, in order to prevent ships of foreign na¬ 
tions from going in or any Confederate ship from going 
out. This was a blockade like that which England 
and France tried against one another, 1793-1815. Like 
that earlier blockade, this one of 1861-1865 was at first 
a “ paper blockade.” Its efficiency, however, increased 
from month to month as the number of ships in the 

navy of the United States increased. 

% 

The Three Problems in Foreign Relations. 

(a)—Foreign Trade with the Confederacy. — Eng¬ 
lish merchants were selling goods in the Confederacy, 


THE CIVIL WAR 


335 


and the United States was affronted. It was all right, 
however, for the merchants of outside nations to sell and 
ship goods to the Confederacy, if they were willing to 
run the risk of capture by the warships of the United 
States, just as it was all right for the merchants of the 
United S.tates to sell goods to Germany in the late 
World War, before the United States entered the war. 
All right, but dangerous. England could take no offense 
when these things were done by Americans, 1914-1917. 
nor had the United States any reason to be offended, 
when the same things were done by the English, 1861— 
1865. 

( b ) Recognition of the Confederacy — England was 
also within her rights, though herein she greatly offended 
the North, when, in the early stages of the war, she 
recognized the Confederate States of America as bellig¬ 
erents. The United States wanted to regard the Con¬ 
federates as mere revolting people, rebels, with no 
rights and privileges, and she wanted the otjier nations 
to take the same position. This England refused to 
do. She recognized the Confederates as belligerents, 
that is, as people not yet independent, but struggling 
for independence and possessing the right to wage war 
according to the rules of war. For revolting peoples, 
belligerency was the first step to independence. The 
North feared that England might go a step further, and 
recognize the independence of the Confederacy. From 
such recognition the Confederacy would receive great 
encouragement and a standing with the nations of the 
world that might make it possible for it to get loans 
abroad and possibly a military alliance with some other 
nation. 

(c) The Trent Affair. — Lincoln and the North were 


336 


THE CIVIL WAR 


also offended at the very end of the first year of the 
war, when England sent her what was considered a 
humiliating demand. A United States warship prac¬ 
ticed the right of search, with which the warships of 
England were quite familiar in the days before 1812, 
against an English mail vessel, the Trent. Two Con¬ 
federate envoys on their way to Europe were taken 
from this vessel. England in strong language forthwith 
demanded the surrender of the men, just as the United 
States, under Presidents Washington, Adams, Jefferson, 
and Madison, had made similar demands on England 
in many an instance a half century and more earlier. 
President Lincoln remained calm. He saw that the 
right was entirely on the English side, and he gave 
the men up. He was very anxious to keep the peace 
with Queen Victoria and her government, in order to 
ward off British recognition and possible open aid to 
the South. With the ships of the British on its side, 
the South could have snapped its fingers at the 
blockade. 

Policy as to the Slaves. — Throughout the first year 
of the war the United States officially fought only to 
save the Union, not to free the slaves. “ The Union 
Forever,” was one of the most popular of the songs of 
the Northern people. Yet an even more popular song 
ran, “ John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the 
grave, but his soul goes marching on.” People in the 
North wondered if the men and women for whom John 
Brown died should be given back to the South, when 
they fell into the Northern lines by the fortunes of 
war. Thousands did thus make their escape, and they 
were not given up. All realized that a mighty blow 
could be delivered against the opposing states, if the 


337 


THE CIVIL WAR 

President should free the slaves by a proclamation and 
summon them formally into the Northern lines, arm 
them, and allow them to fight for their own liberty. 
Such a policy of emancipation would please anti-slav¬ 
ery England and go far toward rendering it impossible 
for that great liberty-loving nation to come to the 
help of those who were fighting for the right to keep 
slaves. Lincoln went slowly in the matter, however, 
for such a policy would displease the Border States, 
which were on the side of the North but still held 

slaves. 



The Monitor and the Merrimac 


THE SECOND YEAR, 1862 

The Monitor and the Merrimac. — In the next year, 
the two problems of Washington and Richmond re¬ 
ceived much attention. In a spectacular duel between 
ironclad vessels, the first important one in the history 
of naval warfare, the northern Monitor worsted the 
southern Merrimac. The battle too %. p ace ^ ^ 
mouth of the James River. On the day previous le 
Merrimac, which was a wooden ship captured from 




338 


THE CIVIL WAR 


United States at the outbreak of the war, but was now 
newly clad in iron and renamed by the South the 
Virginia, had destroyed several wooden ships of the 
North, including the Congress and the Cumberland . 
Such exploits, if not stopped, might break the block¬ 
ade, put into the hands of the South the means of 
destroying Washington, Philadelphia, New York, and 
other Northern seaboard cities, and win foreign recog¬ 



nition of the independence of the Confederacy. The 
moment was extremely critical. At night, while the 
Merrimac was resting from its victory over the wooden 
ships of the Union, preparatory to going out on the 
next morning to complete her work of destruction, an 
utterly new type of boat, the Monitor, arrived on the 
scene from the North. This Northern champion 
was coated with iron like the Merrimac, and was quite 
able to withstand shot and shell; but she possessed two 
other advantages, which her rival did not have. The 
first was a peculiar raft-like shape, which greatly di- 








THE CIVIL WAR 


339 


minished her exposed surface; and the second was a 
revolving turret on this raft, which enabled her to fire 
in any direction without turning the whole boat. “ A 
Yankee cheese box on a raft,” she was called at the 
time. At daybreak the overtowering Merrimac was 
surprised by the sight of her smaller antagonist. Im¬ 
mediately the two boats opened fire on one another, 
but after engaging in an unequal duel for a' short time 
the Merrimac withdrew and refused further combat. 
The little champion, whose very construction had been 
kept a secret from the country, saved the day for the 
Union. 

McClellan’s Failure to Take Richmond. — With the 
James River opened up to him by the prowess of the 
Monitor, McClellan brought up his Army of the Poto¬ 
mac, 100,000 strong, in boats to the mouth of the river, 
near the scene of the surrender of Cornwallis in 1781. 
The Union general had been drilling his men since 
the battle of Bull Run. He took Yorktown and a few 
other places, 'and came within sight of the church 
spires of Richmond, but could not take the city. Dis¬ 
appointment in the North was great. Emboldened by 
McClellan’s failure, General Robert E. Lee, the mili¬ 
tary leader of the South, then marched north from 
Richmond and defeated the Northerners several times, 
once on the battlefield of Bull Run of the previous 
year. But he was held at Antietam in Maryland by 
McClellan in one of the bloodiest battles of the war. 
Lee withdrew to Richmond, and delivered another 
crushing defeat to the Federals at Fredericksburg. 

Victories in the West. — The reverses on land in the 
East were offset by great Union successes in the West. 
Fighting for the retention of Kentucky in the Union 


340 


THE CIVIL WAR 


and for an open pathway over its territory into the 
Confederacy, Commodore Foote with his gunboats as- 



0 10 20 40 60 


Operations in the East 

« 

cended the Tennessee River from the Ohio and took 
Fort Henry, while General Grant with land forces cap¬ 
tured Fort Donelson on the Cumberland. Both forts were 
in western Tennessee. Making the most of his advan- 













THE CIVIL WAR 


341 


tage Grant pushed on into the Confederacy, defeating 
the latter’s forces at Shiloh on the Tennessee, and at 
Corinth in northern Alabama. A Confederate advance 
into Kentucky, which reached as far as Louisville on 
the Ohio, was repulsed. Possession of the Mississippi 
as far south as Vicksburg, was secured when Island No. 
10, Fort Pillow, and Memphis fell before the Unionists. 



Operations in the West 


Capture of New Orleans. — The capture of New Or¬ 
leans, the greatest city and seaport of the South, opened 
the river to the forces of the LTnion from the mouth 
as far north as Port Hudson, which was about two hun¬ 
dred miles south of Vicksburg. The commander of 
the victorious expedition was Captain, or after the vic¬ 
tory, Rear Admiral, Farragut, who as a boy had fought 
in the navy of his country against the British in the 













342 


THE CIVIL WAR 


war of 1812-1815. At his side was young Lieutenant 
George Dewey, who was later to be the hero of the 
battle of Manila Bay in the War against Spain in 1898. 
To reach the city from the Gulf, Farragut’s ships were 
obliged to run the gauntlet of many Southern forts, to 
break through iron chains that spanned the river, and 
to defeat a fleet of Southern gunboats standing by. 


SCALE OF MILES 


2n 


',40 


60 


New Orleans 



Emancipation. — Sobered by the tremendous respon¬ 
sibilities of his office, and rendered cautious by the 
necessity of holding the pro-slavery people of the Bor¬ 
der States loyal to the Union, Lincoln moved with 
great moderation against slavery. His first plan, for 
the United States to buy all the slaves of the Border 
States at the enormous price of $175,000,000, was re¬ 
jected by the people of these states themselves. Then 
he proposed to remove the cause of the war, root and 
branch, by settling all the blacks in colonies in some 
country outside the United States. Both masters and 
slaves objected to this, the latter on the ground that 







THE CIVIL WAR 


343 

they were good Americans and as such ought to have 
the right to remain in the country. Lincoln then ap¬ 
proved a bill of Congress prohibiting slavery in the 
District of Columbia and paying the masters there for 



An Argument for the Use of Negro Soldiers 
Cartoon from Vanity Fair 

Gentleman oj Color: “Yah! Yah! Darkey hab de best ob it 
now. Dar’s de White Man’s draff and here's de Niggah’s! ” 


the slaves, another prohibiting slavery in the territories 
of the United States and still another confiscating 
Southern property, which' in the opinion of some meant 
that slaves might be taken under the act as property. 




















344 


THE CIVIL WAR 


None of these measures affected the great mass of the 
slaves in the Southern States. In order to help them, 
on the first day of January, 1863, President Lincoln, 
by military power, announced in a solemn proclama¬ 
tion of emancipation, “ I do order and declare that all 
persons held as slaves within the designated states are, 
and henceforth shall be free.” At the same time, the 
President began to allow the negroes, Southern as well 
as Northern, to fight in the army of the United States, 
whereas previously the blacks in the army had per¬ 
formed only manual labor. Lincoln’s proclamation and 
its results proved to be one of the great events of his¬ 
tory. The President had given ample warning to the 
Southerners that he would take this extreme step, for 
on the day after the victory of his armies at the battle 
of Antietam in September, 1862, he had surprised the 
country by the announcement, in a preliminary proc¬ 
lamation, that full and complete emancipation was to 
come in one hundred days, if the Southerners at that 
time still held out against the Union. 

Foreign Recognition of the Confederacy. — The Eng¬ 
lish recognition of the belligerency of the Confederacy 
and the Trent Affair, had aroused a sudden wave of ill 
feeling in the North against England. This the wise 
Lincoln did not attempt to foster, but for the permanent 
advantage of his country did everything in his power 
to assuage. To achieve the great end of warding off 
English recognition of the independence of the revolt¬ 
ing states, he purposely propitiated the anti-slavery 
sentiment of the English in several ways. He made 
with that country a very strict treaty to stop the slave 
trade on the coast of Africa. His efforts to buy the 
slaves in the United States and to colonize them outside 


THE CIVIL WAR 


345 


had, too, a strong moral effect throughout England. 
Then the momentous Proclamation of Emancipation, 
from Lincoln’s pen, on the first of January, 1863, ren- 



The Antietam Campaign 


dered it simply impossible for the conscience of the 
English people to tolerate aid of any kind by their 
government to a government that was founded on 
slavery. The influence of the Emancipation Proclama- 
















346 


THE CIVIL WAR 


tion on foreign relations was a large factor in bringing 
about the defeat of the South. Aid from England, 
which for so many months in the beginning of the war 
seemed near, was at last no longer possible. 


THE THIRD YEAR, 1863 

The Washington-Richmond Fighting. — The see-saw 
of the armies between Washington and Richmond kept 
up through the third year of the war. Lee won an 
overwhelming victory over the Army of the Potomac 
at Chancellorsville, sixty miles north of Richmond, and 
then started out on the South’s annual invasion of the 
North. 

The Battlefield of Gettysburg. — What has since been 
generally accounted the greatest battle of the war now 
took place on the free soil of the North at Gettysburg, 
in southern Pennsylvania, fifty miles south of Harris¬ 
burg, the capital of the state. The little town w r as the 
center of nine roads and one railroad, which converged 
there from various directions. These, together with 
the ranges of the surrounding hills, gave the location 
considerable military value. Running south from the 
town was a low wooded ridge, called Cemetery Ridge 
because the village cemetery lay upon it. At the north¬ 
ern end of this ridge, between the cemetery and the 
town, was Culp’s Hill; and at the southern end, about 
three miles below the town, the ridge terminated in 
a great conical rock, called Round Top. Near this, 
toward the town, was Little Round Top. About a mile 
west of Cemetery Ridge and parallel to it, though ex¬ 
tending farther north, was Seminary Ridge, named for 
a Lutheran Theological Seminary situated on it. Be- 


THE CIVIL WAR 


347 


tween the two ridges was a fairly flat and open ex¬ 
panse, covered with green fields and orchards. 



Robert E. Lee 

Northern Anxiety. — Lee’s advance guard, in its 
march northward, came to within four miles of Harris¬ 
burg, and his whole army was scattered over the sur¬ 
rounding country. The Southerners had come their 
farthest. A terrible fate would befall the Northern 
cities, with their banks, and their great storehouses of 
food and clothing, if Lee could not be stopped. Business 
in the North waited on news. The whole nation was 
keyed up to the top notch of anxiety over wdiat the 
days might bring forth. President Lincoln seemed to 





348 


THE CIVIL WAR 


know as little as anyone else what to do in the crisis. 
He hesitated, and then removed Hooker from command 
of the Army of the Potomac, and called General Meade, 
of the state of Pennsylvania, to that post. 



0 20 00 100 
The Gettysburg Campaign 


The Battle of Gettysburg. — On July 1, the first day 
of the battle, Lee’s men drove Meade’s away from the 
northern part of Seminary Ridge southward through 
the town to Cemetery Ridge. On the second and third 
days, July 2 and 3, the battle raged between the Union 
lines of the western edge of Cemetery Ridge, just within 
the woods where the trees gave some protection, and the 









THE CIVIL WAR 


349 


Southern line on the opposite eastern side of Seminary 
Ridge, just back of the protecting trees there. At last, 
toward the end of the third day, at what he deemed 



Field of Gettysburg Confederate Line 

the supreme moment of the battle, Lee ordered 15,000 
picked men under the command of Pickett to leave 



















350 


THE CIVIL WAR 


their wooded screen and charge across the fields inter¬ 
vening between the two ridges, to attack the Union 
forces on Cemetery Ridge. For an hour or so the guns 
of the North had been silent, a sign, thought Lee, that 
they were beaten. As Pickett’s men started out the in¬ 
tense silence was broken only by their own “ rebel yell.” 
On they went at double quick. Then the Northern 
cannon, which had stopped firing not because they were 
beaten but because they wished to decoy the deluded 
Southerners into a death trap, opened up with such 
blasts and explosions of artillery as the continent had 
never before seen or heard. The guns of the men in the 
trenches began to flash. On came Pickett’s staggering 
but thinning ranks. A few reached their goal, the 
trenches of the men of the North, and gripped with 
their foe, only to retreat. The high water mark of the 
rebellion had been reached, and the forces of the South 
were turned back in defeat. 

In this battle the Northern army numbered 90,000, 
the Southern 75,000, and the total loss on the two sides 
was 51,000. 

Fourth of July, 1863. — A memorable Fourth of 
July indeed followed for the North, a sad Fourth for 
the South. On this day came not only the final news 
from Gettysburg, but also the other glorious news that 
Grant had captured Vicksburg, and opened up the Mis¬ 
sissippi as far south as Port Hudson. 

Vicksburg and the Surrounding Country. — Vicks¬ 
burg, “ the Queen City of the Bluffs,” had been con¬ 
sidered well nigh beyond capture for several reasons. 
There was, first, the existence of soft alluvial soil along 
the banks of the Mississippi, cut by countless bayous 
and streams, which rendered it impossible for an army 


THE CIVIL WAR 


351 


to operate in the vicinity. A second difficulty was the 
position of the city on top of a plateau, which rose 200 
feet above the river, with a series of similar plateaus 
north and south of the city, dividing the alluvial plains 
of the river banks at intervals, for example, at Colum¬ 
bus, Fort Pillow, Memphis, Vicksburg, Grand Gulf, and 



SCALE OF MILES _ 

0 50 100 150 

The Vicksburg Campaign 

Port Hudson. Third, there were deep and narrow ra¬ 
vines cutting the clay plateau of Vicksburg in every 
direction in the rear of the city, which brought it about 
that an invading army must approach the city along 
the crest of one of these ridges between the ravines. 
There was no other way. 











352 


THE CIVIL WAR 


The Surrender of Vicksburg. — After five unsuccess¬ 
ful attempts at the stronghold, in and out of the bay¬ 
ous and swamps, Grant’s army, which at last found 
itself north of the city on the west bank of the river, 
made its way to the south and crossed the river to the 
plateau of Grand Gulf, the next plateau south of Vicks¬ 
burg. His men marched in a wide sweep from here 
to Jackson, the capital of Mississippi, and then 
straight west astride the crests of the. ridges between the 
ravines, till they were in the immediate rear of the 
city. 

Vicksburg surrendered July 4, Port Hudson July 8. 
“ The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea,” 
declared the President; the Union controlled every part 
of the continent’s great interior thoroughfare, and the 
Confederacy was cut in two. 

The Problem at Chattanooga. — In this same event¬ 
ful summer of 1863, Rosecrans, in command of another 
Union army, forced the Confederate General Bragg to 
retreat in Tennessee, after which Chattanooga was the 
problem. 

Chattanooga was an important railroad center, the 
connecting link between Virginia and the West. South 
from the general vicinity of the city, extending almost 
from the very banks of the Tennessee River itself, ran 
three mountain ridges. First in order was Raccoon 
Mountain; second, Lookout Mountain, 1,400 feet above 
the waters of the river, from which seven states might 
be seen; and third, Missionary Ridge. East of these 
three mountains, in order, ran Lookout Creek, Chat¬ 
tanooga Creek, and Chickamauga Creek. 

Chickamauga. — According to the plan which he had 
formed to manoeuvre Bragg away from Chattanooga, 


THE CIVIL WAR 


353 


Rosecrans had made a wide detour south of the town, 
and had led his army successfully over the three inter- 



the enemy at Chicka- 

mauga, three miles south of Rossville (not on the map 
here given); but he had unluckily divided his army in 
getting across the three ridges, and was defeated before 
he could unite his forces. In retreating northward, how¬ 
ever, Rosecrans contrived to take his army into Chatta¬ 
nooga, which Bragg then besieged. How to save the 
Union army, here hemmed in, became a pressing prob¬ 
lem. The President called on the victor at Vicksburg 
to go to Chattanooga and try his hand. Grant accepted 
promptly. 

Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge. — When 
Grant came upon the scene to command the beleagured 
forces, he first waited for reinforcements of men and 















354 


THE CIVIL WAR 


supplies, and then proceeded to follow out his plan to 
drive off the besiegers. 

Sherman, on the Union left, led his forces across 
Brown’s Ferry, and up Moccasin Point to a point op¬ 
posite the mouth of Chickamauga Creek, where he 
crossed the Tennessee. Thomas, on the Union center, 
east of Chattanooga, took Orchard Knob, whence Gen- 



George H. Thomas 


eral Grant could observe the whole unfolding pano¬ 
rama, while Hooker, on the Union right, swept across 
Lookout Creek, and on up through the clouds to the 
top of Lookout Mountain, safely securing the high 
northern point of the ridge, overlooking the city. Sher¬ 
man on the left was blocked for a time; but Thomas 
on the center stormed Missionary Ridge, and Hooker, 
descending the east side of Lookout Mountain and 
clearing the valley of Chattanooga Creek, gained the 
top of Missionary Ridge and pressed in on the enemy’s 


THE CIVIL WAR 


355 



xrows 


WwFriara Ford 


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I ) /Anderson 
4f M/yiL-sdfl' /r< Fort 
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pAifttWood. 

'.■ % FQfchard 
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j^^TWURJlANS 


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CILLE 3 FIE 




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waChatch 

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Red House 


RJossvilleiS 


SCALE OF MlCES 


Newmans Springy 


left. Totally defeated, Bragg retreated in the direction 
of Atlanta, Georgia. From first to last the battle raged 
for three days, November 23-25. Grant’s telegram an¬ 
nouncing the victory was read in the North on Thanks¬ 
giving Day. 


The Battle at Chattanooga 

Knoxville. —With Grant firmly established in Chatta¬ 
nooga, beyond the possibility of being dislodged, the 
Confederates decided to desist from the siege of Knox¬ 
ville, in eastern Tennessee. Thus the whole of the state 
of Tennessee was left under Union control. 

The Blockade and the War on the Ocean. — Such 
were the fortunes of the war in the year 1863 in and 
about Washington and Richmond, in the Border States, 





















356 


THE CIVIL WAR 


on the Mississippi, and in the interior of the Confed¬ 
eracy. The war on the ocean was still going on. The 
blockade stiffened throughout the year, but at the same 
time the Southern navy, the Alabama, the Florida, the 
Shenandoah, and other vessels, continued to destroy 
Northern ships by the score. For her breach of neu¬ 
trality, in allowing these vessels, which were built within 
her borders, to get away to sea for service for the 



The Alabama 


Confederacy, England was called sternly to account by 
the United States. When the United States carried the 
controversy with England to the point of threatening 
the latter power with war, if she did not stop the un¬ 
neutral practice, England did stop, and the Confeder¬ 
ates received no more ships from across the water. This 
change in her policy came just in time to prevent the 
departure from English shores of two ironclad rams, 
similar in their coating of iron to the Merrimac, and 
quite as dangerous to the blockade and the safety of 
the northern seaport cities. 










THE CIVIL WAR 


357 


THE FOURTH YEAR, 1864 

Grant’s Advance on Richmond. — The military ac¬ 
tivities of the North in 1864 consisted in the develop¬ 
ment of two great campaigns. First, that of Grant, who 
had been brought to the east from his western victories 
at Vicksburg and Chattanooga to try his fortunes 
against Richmond. As usual, the armies had remained 





Libby Prison. A Famous Confederate Prison 
From a war time engraving. 


inactive through the winter. Fighting began in eastern 
Virginia in the month of May. After indecisive con¬ 
tests in the wilderness north of Richmond, whence 
he sent his famous dispatch to the President, “ I pro¬ 
pose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer/’ 
Grant skillfully contrived to change his base. With an 
alert enemy in front of him all the time, he succeeded 







358 


THE CIVIL WAR 


in taking his army from the north of Richmond to the 
south of the city, where he settled down to the siege 
of the town of Petersburg. Here he remained to the 
end of the year, unable to take either Petersburg or 
Richmond. On the other hand, despite this apparent 
stalemate, the North wrested from the South in this 



year the rich agricultural regions of the valley of the 
Shenandoah, a storehouse of supplies on which Lee at 
Richmond and Petersburg greatly relied. A series of 
three swift victories in the valley by Sheridan did 
the work. On the Gulf of Mexico, too, Farragut cap¬ 
tured Mobile Bay, though not the city of Mobile. 

Sherman’s March. — Sherman, who had been left in 
command at Chattanooga, when Grant was brought 
from there to eastern Virginia, set out in the same month 
of May, 1864, to march southward from Chattanooga 
to Atlanta, Georgia, with an army of 100,000 men. 
Every inch of the way was contested by 75,000 Confed¬ 
erates. Sherman reached Atlanta, an important rail- 













THE CIVIL WAR 


359 

road and manufacturing town of eight or ten thousand 
people in the very heart of the agricultural sections of 
the Confederacy. Burning this city and pillaging and 
laying waste the country, he boldly cut loose from his 



William T. Sherman 


connections with the North and with his own base of 
supplies, and plunged into the farming lands of Georgia, 
out of all communication with the government at Wash¬ 
ington for four weeks. During the holiday season he 
electrified the nation by presenting to it the city of 
Savannah as a Christmas gift. 

The Re-election of Lincoln. — In the month of May 
of this year of 1864, while Grant was begin- 





360 


THE CIVIL WAR 


ning his advance on Richmond and Sherman his 
march on Atlanta, Lincoln was renominated for the 
presidency. He was the candidate this time of a Union 
party composed of both Republicans and War Demo¬ 
crats, united on the platform of fighting the war to a 
finish. The outcome of the political campaign, which 
was thus begun, was bound to depend on campaigns 



Not According to the Constitution 


Cartoon from Vanity Fair 

Mr. Copperhead: I know my house is on fire, just as well as 
you do. If you want to save it play on it from the outside as 
much as you choose, but I deny your right to enter without 
my permission; my house is my castle, and any attempt to 
enter it by force is clearly un-con-sti-tu-tion-al. 



































THE CIVIL WAR 


361 


and battles still unfought at the time of the nomination. 
Gloom settled down on the President’s political sup¬ 
porters, as soon as it was apparent that Grant was not 
succeeding in his efforts to take Petersburg and Rich¬ 
mond. In the midst of all the discouragement, and add¬ 
ing to it, the Democrats, sometimes called Copperheads 
for their venomous opposition to the war, nominated 
General McClellan as their candidate for President, on 
the platform that the war was a failure and that fight¬ 
ing ought to stop. Even the stoutest hearted Republi¬ 
cans lost courage at times. Then, in quick succession 
came the news from Sherman at Atlanta, Sheridan in 
the Shenandoah valley, and Farragut at Mobile Bay. 
These persuasive arguments that the war was after all 
a success McClellan could not answer. Lincoln was 
triumphantly elected by 212 electoral votes to 21 for 
McClellan. 


THE FIFTH YEAR, 1865 

Sherman’s March to the North. — Sherman left Sa¬ 
vannah February 1, 1865. He next took Columbia, 
South Carolina, which led the Confederates to evacuate 
Charleston, where the war had opened. From Columbia, 
tending to the northeast, he came to Goldsboro, North 
Carolina, where he again established his base on the 
sea. He was now close to Grant, who was hammering 
away at the doomed city of Richmond. 

Grant’s Capture of Richmond. — Grant began his 
spring campaign on the south of Richmond very early 
in 1865. Sheridan came up from the scene of his con¬ 
quests of the previous fall in the Shenandoah valley, 
and with his aid Grant broke through Lee’s thin lines 
into Petersburg and Richmond, April 2—3, causing the 


362 


THE CIVIL WAR 


Confederates to abandon their capital. Lee laid down 
his arms at Appomattox Court House, April 9, and re¬ 
ceived generous terms. He was allowed to keep his 
own sword, and his men to take their horses with them, 
for, said Grant, they would need them in the spring 



Ulysses S. Grant 


plowing. The soldiers of the two armies, enemies for 
four years, fraternized after the surrender, and in the 
friendliest fashion partook of the same rations out of 
the well-filled knapsacks of the Unionists. Another 
Confederate army surrendered to Sherman on April 26, 
and the war was over. 

The Assassination of President Lincoln. — From the 

capture of Petersburg and Richmond to the surrender of 






THE CIVIL WAR 


363 



Cjupspper 

CEDA-R^i 


‘JZff C harlottesvi lle_^ 


.\-\° A v> 

•n. p 'v e 

... o^VfPe^rsbur 


Operations in Virginia 

North had fought for had been won, all their suffer¬ 
ings and sacrifices rewarded and the Union preserved, 
“ one and inseparable.” But their joy was turned into 
mourning when the word was flashed over the country 
that President Lincoln had been shot. He was assassi¬ 
nated at an evening performance in Ford’s theater in 


Lee was a week of terrible excitement, like that of the 
opening week of the war. In 1861 it had been the 
excitement of fear and dread on both sides, but now 
in 1865, in the North, it was the excitement of victory, 
and in the South the despair of defeat. All that the 


Union Forces -■»->— 


Confederate , 
SCALE OF MILES 















364 


THE CIVIL WAR 


Washington, by John Wilkes Booth, a half-crazed 
Southern sympathizer. The President lingered uncon¬ 
scious till the next morning, when he passed away, sur¬ 
rounded by his family and friends. The nation was 
stunned. Men cried in the streets at the thought of 
the fate of the friend whom all loved and revered. 

The poet, Walt Whitman, voiced the anguish of the 
nation in the following lines: 

“ O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, 

The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is 
won, 

The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, 
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and 
daring; 

But O heart! heart! heart! 

O the bleeding drops of red, 

Where on the deck my Captain lies, 

Fallen cold and dead. 

“ O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells; 

Rise up — for you the flag is flung — for you the bugle trills, 
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths, for you ,the shores 
a-crowding, 

For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces 
turning; 

Here Captain! dear father! 

This arm beneath your head! 

It is some dream that on the deck 
You’ve fallen cold and dead. 

“ My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still, 

My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will. 
The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and 
done, 

From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won; 
Exult O shores, and ring O bells! 

But I with mournful tread, 

Walk the deck my Captain lies, 

Fallen cold and dead.” 


THE CIVIL WAR 


365 


Booth fled across the Potomac into Virginia, but he 
was overtaken and shot in a barn after a pursuit of 
twelve days. Some of his accomplices were hanged, 
some imprisoned. 

The Cost of the War. — There were more than two 
thousand battles, big and little, in the course of the 
war; and probably over 600,000 men were either killed 
or died of disease, 350,000 in the armies of the North 
and 250,000 in the Southern armies. The exact ex- 



Birthplace of Abraham Lincoln 


pense of the conflict in money cannot be calculated. 
The cost to the North was $3,250,000,000 over and above 
the ordinary expenses of administering the government 
in times of peace. In 1865, when the national debt of 
the United States was just a little under $3,000,000,000, 
the annual interest payment by the government reached 
$140,000,000. Every cent of the money loaned by the 
Southern people to their government was lost, when the 
Confederacy went out of existence. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. Where was Fort Sumter? Why did President Lincoln 
send the food ship to the fort? What was the effect in the 






366 


THE CIVIL WAR 


North of the bombardment of the fort? The effect in the 
South? When was the first blood shed in the war? What 
was the first battle of the war? Why was it important for 
the North to gain possession of the Mississippi? What was 
the blockade? Why was it very difficult? Were the English 
merchants justified in selling goods to Confederate merchants? 
How did England regard the Confederacy? What was the 
Trent Affair? How did the question of what to do with the 
escaped slaves come up in the first year of the war? 

2. What was memorable in the battle of the Monitor and 
the Merrimac? What was McClellan’s campaign against 
Richmond? Who was the Union leader in the West? What 
victories did he win? Who captured New Orleans? What 
was the Emancipation Proclamation? What were Lincoln’s 
chief methods in warding off English recognition of the inde¬ 
pendence of the Confederacy? 

3. Why was Gettysburg a critical battle? Why did the 
North rejoice so much over the capture of Vicksburg? What 
news came to the people on July 4 and on Thanksgiving Day 
of the year 1863? What damage was done by the Alabama? 

4. What two great campaigns did the North carry out 
in 1864? and under what two leaders? What did Sheridan 
and Farragut do in this year? What was there unusual in 
Sherman’s march through Georgia? Whom did Lincoln de¬ 
feat for the presidency in 1864? What military victories 
increased the enthusiasm of the people for Lincoln’s re- 
election ? 

5. What two leaders came to Grant’s assistance in his 
campaign against Richmond? When did Lee lay down his 
arms? What was the motive for Lincoln’s assassination? 
What was the fate of his assassin? How many lost their 
lives in the Civil War? What was the national debt of the 
United States in 1865? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the South made a mistake when they 
fired on Fort Sumter. 

2. Resolved, That Lincoln ought not to have given up 
Mason and Slidell, captured on the Trent. 


THE CIVIL WAR 


367 


Topics for Compositions 

1. The United States Sanitary Commission. Rhodes, 
United States, V, 244-259; Fite, Social and Industrial Con¬ 
ditions, 276-283. 

2. The Emancipation Proclamation. Rhodes, United States, 
IV, 157-165; Halsey, Epochs, VIII, 107-111. 

3. Robert E. Lee. Bradford, Lee the American; Bruce, 
Robert E. Lee; Page, Robert E. Lee; Trent, Robert E. Lee. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Fort Sumter. Halsey, Epochs, VIII, 58-67; Rhodes, 
United States, III, 349-374. 

2. The Alabama. Halsey, Epochs, VIII, 145-14S; and IX, 
159-174; Rhodes, United States, IV, 85-94; Elson, Side 
Lights on American History, 218-242. 

3. Monitor and Merrimac. Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero 
Tales, 183-197; Roosevelt and Others, Stories of the Re¬ 
public, 260. 

4. Gettysburg. Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero Tales, 225- 
237; Roosevelt and Others, Stories of the Republic, 294. 

Important Dates 

1861. Fort Sumter surrendered. 

1862. The Monitor and the Merrimac. 

1862. New Orleans taken. 

1863. Emancipation proclaimed. 

1863. Gettysburg and Vicksburg won. 

1864. Atlanta taken. 

1865. Surrender at Appomatox. 

Assassination of Lincoln. 

Books to Remember 

1. I. M. Tarbell, Abraham Lincoln. 

2. John Fiske, Mississippi Valley. 


CHAPTER XX 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL 
QUESTIONS, 1865-1898 

RECONSTRUCTION 

Andrew Johnson. — The Vice-President of the United 
States, Andrew Johnson, who succeeded , to the presi¬ 
dency at the death of Lincoln, had been governor of 
the state of Tennessee and had been a member of both 
houses of Congress. Unfortunately he lacked Lincoln’s 
ability to get along with men, and he quarreled with 
Congress and the political leaders of his party on al¬ 
most every question arising out of the war. 

The End of Slavery. — When Grant and Sherman 
finally handed the terms of surrender to the Southern 
forces, very properly nothing was said about the sub¬ 
ject of slavery, on the theory that the settlement of 
this question should be reserved to the President and 
Congress. The Emancipation Proclamation had not 
freed the slaves of the Border States, which were not 
in rebellion, nor in a few other places in the South then 
held by the United States. To make freedom universal 
in every part of the country, Congress and the states 
passed the thirteenth amendment to the Constitution, 
forbidding slavery in the United States. This disposed 
of the great cause of the war for all time to come, but 
it was at the same time the beginning of new trouble. 

368 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 369 

The Freedmen. — The new question was, what to do 
with the negroes now that they were free, for they 
could not take care of themselves. Ignorant, super¬ 
stitious, used only to work with the hand and never 
with the head, always under a master to direct them 
and shoulder responsibility for their food, clothing, 
shelter, and medicine, with minds undeveloped for want 
of training and opportunity, this great mass of human¬ 
ity, suddenly cast on its own resources, could not get 
on in the race of life without assistance. How should 
the freedmen be looked out for? Should it be by the 
people of the unfriendly states where they had lived 
and worked for centuries, or by the government of the 
United States? 

The Fate of the Conquered States of the South.—• 

Another problem equally important and equally diffi¬ 
cult was raised, when the people asked if it would be 
wise to allow the states that had lately been in re¬ 
bellion, immediately to take part in the administration 
of the government. Should ex-Confederate generals, 
and ex-members of the Congress of the Confederate 
States of America be allowed to sit as members of the 
Senate and House of Representatives at Washington 
within a few months after they had been fighting with 
hatred in their hearts to defy that Congress? If ex¬ 
slaveholders should at once begin to take part in mak¬ 
ing the laws of the United States, would they not, 
consciously or unconsciously, take their old view of 
things, and make laws accordingly? What indeed was 
the best and safest way to get the conquered states 
back into the Union? 

Reconstruction. — In regard to reconstructing the 
Union, President Lincoln and President Johnson after 


370 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


him generously decided that the Southern States should 
be allowed to come back to take part in the govern¬ 
ment of the United States, if they agreed to the aboli¬ 
tion of slavery. Congress decided that this was too 
generous, in fact unwise, and by law declared that the 
states, in order to get back, must also pass laws, satis¬ 
factory to Congress, for the protection of the freedmen. 
The South refusing, Congress grew more stern, and 
passed laws of its own for the care of the blacks, 
set up military governments over the unhappy states, 
and announced that the latter could get back into the 
Union only if they would let the negroes vote in the 
necessary preliminary state elections. At this same 
time, by a law of Congress, most of the Southern whites 
were disqualified from voting. In other words, the 
conquered states could come back and be states again 
in the Union, if they would consent to turn over the 
administration of things practically to the ex-slaves. 
Extreme measures as to the civil rights of the negroes 
were embodied in the fourteenth amendment to the Con¬ 
stitution, which the hard-driven states also must accept 
before getting back. 

Negro Suffrage. — The defense of the Congressional 
plan of giving the ballot to the ignorant and helpless 
freedmen was that only with this protection could the 
latter secure their rights at the hands of their ex¬ 
masters. This and the provisions of the fourteenth 
amendment were deemed necessary to save the Africans 
from being again reduced to slavery. The fifteenth 
amendment, now proposed by Congress, went further 
and formally declared that the right to vote could not 
be denied to anyone on account of race, color, or pre¬ 
vious condition of servitude. 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 371 

The Impeachment of President Johnson. — The quar¬ 
rel between the President and Congress over these ques¬ 
tions of how to reconstruct the Union after the war 
became so bitter that the House of Representatives 
wanted to remove the Chief Magistrate from office. 
They impeached him, that is, brought charges against 
him, before the Senate, and requested that body to 
take the final step of putting him out of office. Johnson 
had vetoed all the important measures of Congress in 
regard to reconstruction, thus forcing Congress to pass 
them over his veto; and he had acted contrary to one 
of its laws about appointments and removals from 
office. He was brought to trial before the Senate os¬ 
tensibly for the infraction of this law. After an ex¬ 
citing trial of two months during the summer of 1868, 
the President escaped conviction by one vote. 

President Grant. — General Grant, a Republican, 
succeeded President Johnson, and held the office for 
two terms. During his presidency the fifteenth amend¬ 
ment became a part of the Constitution. 

The Carpet-Baggers and the Ku Klux Klan. — As 
may be expected, the most common topic of discussion 
in politics during Grant’s presidency was the condition 
of the Southern States. They had then just come back 
into the Union with the votes of the negroes, and were 
governed by the negroes. The latter were aided by 
whites from the North, who, it w T as said, packed all 
their worldly goods in a carpet-bag, and, shouldering 
it, had gone south to do what they could to “ help ” 
the blacks and make their rule a success. Some of 
these “ carpet-baggers ” were honest, but many of them 
were scoundrels. Foolish laws were passed by the 
black law-makers, the public money was wasted ter- 


372 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 

ribly, and thousands of dollars were stolen outright. 
Self-respecting Southerners chafed under the horrible 
regime. In sheer desperation they formed secret organ¬ 
izations to frighten the blacks away from the polls on 
election days, and masked riders at night wdiipped 
and intimidated them in many ways. Congress 



A Trial by the Iyu Klttx Klan 


itself had to intervene. The Ku Klux Klan, the most 
important of these secret organizations of the whites, 
was broken up by very strict national laws. One of 
the first acts of Grant’s successor, Hayes, in 1877, was 
to withdraw from the Southern States the United 
States troops, which Grant had sent there to protect 
the negro governments. This withdrawal of the troops 







































































POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 373 

may be looked upon as the end of political reconstruc¬ 
tion. The whites soon had the control in their own 
hands throughout the South. 

THE SOUTHERN STATES IN THE TWENTIETH 

CENTURY 

Material Progress since 1865. — For a full half 
century after 1865 the cotton planters of the South 
struggled on, raising their crop on borrowed money, 
never able to escape from the toils of their creditors. 
Cotton was a “ cash ,r crop, one that always had to 
be sold immediately for ready cash, whatever the mar¬ 
ket price, to meet interest charges. “ But now,” said 
the Governor of Georgia in 1920, “ w T e have got money 
in the South for the first time since the Civil War. . . . 
Slavery did not end in the South with the Emancipation 
of the negroes. We have been in bondage ourselves 
ever since to that part of the world which we clothe.” 
Abounding prosperity, arising out of the commercial 
possibilities and high prices of the World War, 1914— 
1918, has at last removed the signs of the poverty, which 
was the leading effect of the Civil War in the Southern 
States. 

“ A Million Dollar Seed.” —A part of the new pros¬ 
perity is due to the many uses to which cotton seed 
has been put. At the opening of the Cotton Exposition 
in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1881, a New Englander said, 
“ If New England had a plant that produced nothing 
but your cotton seed, regardless of the lint, she would 
convert its product into incalculable wealth.” The 
South has taken up the challenge, until today the seed 
of the cotton plant is worth half as much as the lint 


374 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


itself. There is a crushing mill within reach of every 
cotton plantation, and scores of useful products are 
made from cotton seed. 

Cotton Maufacturing in the South. — Another great 
southern industry, that may be traced largely to the 
Atlanta Exposition of 1881, is the manufacture of cot¬ 
ton cloth. Whereas in the year of the exposition only 
6 per cent of the cotton grown in the South was there 
manufactured into cloth, and the other 94 per cent 
chiefly in New England and Old England, today at least 
one-half of the cotton of Georgia and the Carolinas is 
manufactured into cloth within these states. Cotton 
manufacture in the vicinity of the plantations is an 
assured success. 

Diversification of Industry. — A very important 
phase of Southern industry at present is the fact that in 
many places the Southerners are beginning to abandon 
cotton-growing for the raising of other products, which 
may be depended upon to bring in profit whenever the 
single crop of cotton fails. It is now widely recognized 
that it is a mistake for the Southern farmers to pin their 
faith on cotton alone, and to depend so largely as they 
have done on other states for food supplies. The para¬ 
site, known as the boll weevil, which has destroyed 
millions of dollars’ worth of cotton, has been hailed as 
a public benefactor. In one county in Alabama a mon¬ 
ument has been raised in honor of the pest, because it 
has forced the stricken planters to turn to other prod¬ 
ucts. During the World War, too, when all communi¬ 
ties had to raise every particle of food possible, the 
South had new incentives to turn a part of its energies 
to food crops. 

Elberta Peaches. — Perhaps the most interesting of 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 375 


the new crops which the Southerners are cultivating, is 
Elberta peaches. Some few years after the close of the 
Civil War a Georgian cotton grower, Samuel H. Rump, 
had on his plantation a few peach trees bearing a fruit 
quite unworthy of notice; but one year a seedling in 
the number produced a remarkable yellow free-stone 
peach of great size and .beauty, which was developed 
and put on the market as the Elberta peach, named 
after the planter’s wife. Now there are 2,000,000 El¬ 
berta peach trees in Georgia alone, and in this and 
other states the raising of Elberta peaches is a great 
industry. 

The Negroes and the Ballot. — Despite the guarantee 
of the fifteenth amendment that the ballot should be 
denied to no one on account of “ race, color, or previous 
condition of servitude,” and despite efforts on the part 
of the national government for some years after the 
war to assist and protect the blacks, today the negroes 
are practically denied the right to vote south of 
Mason and Dixon’s Line. The Supreme Court of the 
United States has declared unconstitutional a few of the 
disfranchising laws of the states, but the most of these 
laws remain. 

FINANCES, THE TARIFF, AND SHIP SUBSIDY 

The Greenbacks. — During the war, in place of gold 
and silver money the government issued promises to pay, 
printed on paper and popularly known as “ greenbacks.” 
It was known to all that the government that issued 
these promises had no gold nor silver in the treasury 
to make them good, and it sometimes seemed, when 
the fortunes of war were going against it, that the gov- 


376 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


ernment might go to pieces and never be able to pay its 
notes. Therefore the people did not like to accept the 
greenbacks as equal to gold, and prices, as expressed 
in the paper money, went up, till it took two or three 
paper dollars to equal one of gold. Their value shifted 
from time to time. Men who were profiting from 
the peculiar kind of money and liked to pay their debts 
in it, formed a Greenback party, demanding that Con¬ 
gress make the greenbacks the permanent money of 
the country, and issue them in unlimited quantities. 
Far from consenting, the Secretary of the Treasury got 
together a pile of $150,000,000 in gold in the Treasury 
of the United States, and Congress passed a law which 
announced that the United States was ready to pay the 
greenbacks in gold. No more greenbacks were issued, 
and gold and silver coin began to circulate as money. 

Free Coinage of Silver. — In 1873, while the green¬ 
backs were still the only circulating medium of the 
country, Congress decided to coin no more silver dollars 
at all. Gold was to be the only standard of money, 
although practically none of it was in circulation at 
the time. This dissatisfied certain friends of silver, 
chiefly the mine owners, who started an agitation that 
the government should coin silver as well as gold, in 
fact coin into money for a small fee all the silver that 
anyone might bring into the mints. There was strong 
resistance to this demand for the free coinage of silver 
on the ground that money so coined, would be as bad 
as the greenbacks, because there would be too much 
silver coin and its value would go down like that of 
the greenbacks. Congress compromised on the question, 
and agreed to buy from $2,000,000 to $4,000,000 worth 
of silver for coinage every month. This law was in 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 377 

effect till 1890, but it never fully satisfied the Free- 
Silverites. 

The Defeat of Free Silver. — The advocates of free 
silver won over to their cause the entire Democratic 
party in 1896, and went before the country in the pres¬ 
idential campaign of that year with William Jennings 
Bryan as their candidate for President. The Republi- 



William McKinley 

cans, led by William McKinley, came out strongly for 
gold as the only standard by which to measure the value 
of money, as against the demand of the Democrats 
that silver should be allowed to be a standard of money 
as well as gold. The Republicans were for a single 
standard, the Democrats for a double standard. Bryan 


378 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 

wanted silver to be valued at the rate of sixteen ounces 
of silver to one of gold, which would amount to stamp¬ 
ing an amount of silver as a dollar which was not worth 
a dollar in gold. The conservative classes feared that 
free silver, if accepted, would unsettle the money of 
the country just as much as the greenbacks had done. 
Free silver was badly defeated at the polls, and Mc¬ 
Kinley was elected. 

National Banks. — After the destruction of the Bank 
of the United States by President Jackson, the banking 
business of the country fell into the hands of the private 
banks, which were under state laws, until Congress, 
during the Civil War, created a new style of national 
banks. The new banks were quite different in organi¬ 
zation from that of the earlier days, and were under 
strict national supervision. The scheme survived for 
over a half century. 

The Tariff. — The need for more revenue to pay the 
heavy expenditures of the war, was one of the prime 
features of the finances of the Civil War period; always 
more revenue. Not a session of Congress went by 
throughout the four years of fighting without the rais¬ 
ing of the rates of the tariff. The amount of revenue 
from the tariff increased yearly. When peace was re¬ 
stored, there was still the necessity of paying off the 
enormous national debt, and Congress maintained the 
high rates and even increased them. At last, when the 
need for revenue slowly lessened, the manufacturers, 
who had profited by the high rates, fearing ruin be¬ 
cause of the competition of cheaper goods from Eu¬ 
rope, demanded that the high tariffs be retained. 

Tariff Legislation. Seven Presidents. — The ques¬ 
tion of the tariff came up before the country in one 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 379 


form or another in each successive administration under 
the next seven Presidents. The names of these Pres¬ 
idents were: President Hayes, 1877-1881, Garfield, 
(assassinated by a disappointed office-seeker a few 
months after taking office), 1881, Arthur, 1881-1885. 
Cleveland, 1885-1889, (the first Democratic President 
since James Buchanan), Harrison, 1889-1893, Cleveland, 



Grover Cleveland 


1893-1897, and McKinley, 1897-1901. In his first term 
Cleveland labored for a reduction of the tariff, and 
on the issue of free-trade versus protection was defeated 
for re-election in 1889 by the Republican candidate, 
Harrison. Under Harrison the Republicans revised 
and even increased the rates, while the Democrats in 








380 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 

the second Cleveland administration lowered them 
somewhat. McKinley, as the Republican candidate in 
1896, not only stood for the gold standard but also for 
a new high tariff law, against Bryan, who wanted a 
lower tariff as well as free silver. With McKinley and 
the Republicans in office, Congress accepted the will of 
the people, and again raised the rates. 

Ship Subsidies. — Almost the only disastrous blow 
struck by the Civil War upon the prosperity of the 
North was that upon the merchant ships flying the flag 
of the United States. The commercial ships of the 
United States, which had carried a large percentage of 
the foreign commerce of the country before 1861, prac¬ 
tically disappeared from the ocean as a result of the 
depredations of the Alabama and other Confederate 
ships of war. Some of the northern commerce carriers 
were burned and sunk, some hired themselves out as 
government transport ships, but the great majority of 
them hauled down the flag of their country, ran up 
the Union Jack and became English ships. Thus the 
ships of the English won a supremacy in the foreign 
commerce of the L T nited States that they maintained for 
half a century. During this time the British flag flew 
from a great majority of the ships in America’s greatest 
port, New York Harbor. The American flag was con¬ 
spicuous for its absence on the commerce-carrying ships 
in the harbors of all the seaports of the country. This 
explains the continuous demand after 1865 that Congress 
pay annual sums of money, called subsidies, to Ameri¬ 
can investors, to induce them to build and equip ships 
for ocean service under their own country’s flag. Con¬ 
gress, however, never yielded to the demand. 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 381 


CAPITAL AND LABOR 

Capital. — People as a whole were prosperous during 
the Civil War, with the high and advancing prices 
and heavy demand for all kinds of products for the 
army. Rich men became richer, and manufacturing 
concerns grew fast. But it was a regime of free com- 



Thomas A. Edison 


petition which brought certain undeniable disadvan¬ 
tages upon the manufacturers. To avoid the low prices 
induced by competition, and the duplication of plants 
and of office force, manufacturers gradually came to 
realize that it was to their advantage to cease fighting 
one another over the sale of their goods, and to merge 





382 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


their small and competing organizations into larger and 
larger units. As competition thus diminished, higher 
prices could be charged for commodities, while the 
united capital stock of several manufacturers afforded 
increased funds for the extension of business and the 
improvement of methods. The Western Union Tele- 



John Mitchell 


graph Company at this period grew to enormous pro¬ 
portions, the Standard Oil Company leaped into promi¬ 
nence as a controlling factor in the crude oil business, 
and numerous great railroad and manufacturing cor¬ 
porations were formed. Larger units became the rule 
throughout the industrial world. 










POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 383 

Labor. — When they tried to push their interests 
against organized capital, the laboring classes were at 
a disadvantage because of their lack of organization. 
Men in one factory of a great city did not cooperate 
with their fellow workers in the other factories of the 
same industry in that city, and there was no organi¬ 
zation that included the men of the same industry in 
different cities. Yet organization of labor was the only 
way to enable workers to stand up against organized 
capital. There had been a few labor unions in the days 
of Andrew Jackson, but these had almost all disap¬ 
peared by the time of the Civil War. During and after 
the Civil War new labor unions came thick and fast. 
Capital and labor met in many a clash. Great strikes 
harassed industry after industry, especially during 
Hayes’s administration and again during both adminis¬ 
trations of Cleveland. Laborers were taking a stand for 
their share in the abounding prosperity, for their right 
to organize and to strike, and to agitate in behalf of 
their own interests. 

Congressional Legislation against Organized Capi¬ 
tal, — The abuses and discriminations in rates by the 
large railroads were first dealt with by the legislatures 
of the states. But the Supreme Court finally stepped 
in and declared that the state regulation of the roads 
could not extend beyond the state lines, for, if it 
did, it would mean that separate states were interfer¬ 
ing with interstate commerce. According to the Con¬ 
stitution only Congress could deal with interstate com¬ 
merce. Congress was appealed to; and it passed two 
laws regulating trade carried on from state to state. 
The first was a law setting up an Interstate Commerce 
Commission, to place the interstate railroads under 



384 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


strict national supervision. The second, known as the 
Sherman Anti-Trust Law, declared illegal any large 
business corporation that sought to restrain or to monop¬ 
olize trade from state to state. Inasmuch as stifling 
of competition and killing off a business rival by cut¬ 
ting rates would constitute restraint of trade, this law 
puts a powerful weapon in the hands of the national 
government against some of the evils of big business. 

EDUCATION 

Introduction. — Progress in education had more than 
kept pace with the growth of the country. The ten¬ 
dency toward genuine democracy, so marked from the 
days of Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson, was 
exemplified in the constantly widening public school 
system and in the increasing sums devoted to educa¬ 
tion. Massachusetts abolished tuition fees in her 
schools in 1826, and she was slowly followed by other 
states. In 1821 a public high school had appeared in 
Boston, whence the system spread throughout New Eng¬ 
land and the Middle States and into the new West as 
settlements thickened. The colleges and academies of 
the colonial days multiplied many times over. With 
the growth of manufacturing centers, business colleges 
and night schools sprang up. Roman Catholic schools 
were widespread after the immigration of the Irish. 
Technical and scientific schools had a notable growth, 
as industry demanded trained leaders and investigators; 
and agricultural colleges began a remarkable career. 

Education during the Civil War.— Except for a 
diminished attendance of young men in the colleges, 
which was to be expected when the armies of the Union 
had to be filled, education flourished even during the 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 385 

Civil War. The colleges received large gifts to increase 
their endowments. The public schools were filled to over¬ 
flowing. No matter how fierce the struggle on the field 
of battle, no matter how tremendous the popular ex¬ 
citement over politics and the war, the school bell rang 
out as usual in the first week of September, and day 
by day thereafter summoned the youths of the land to 
their daily tasks. In the crisis, when every ounce of 
the country’s energy had to be devoted to the public 
service, national leaders saw the necessity of foster¬ 
ing education as the best service that could be 
rendered to the present and the best guarantee of the 
future. 

Women’s Colleges. — The modern higher education 
of women was given a definite place in national life 
by the opening of Vassar College in 1865, the first 
adequately equipped institution of collegiate rank for 
women in this country and probably in any land. There 
had been a young ladies’ seminary at Mount Holyoke, 
Massachusetts, for some years, and after the war this 
added more advanced work and became a college. Smith 
College, Wellesley College, and Bryn Mawr College were 
opened in the next few years. In the West the University 
of Wisconsin and the University of Michigan opened 
their doors to women, and other state universities 
followed their example. 

Professional Education for Women. — Medical 
schools began to accept women students, though it 
proved difficult to break down entirely the barriers 
erected by the profession of medicine against this ad¬ 
vance. In the profession of law the advance has been 
even slower. But whereas in the early nineteenth cen¬ 
tury there were few vocations in which women might 


386 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


earn their livelihood, by the twentieth century almost 
all fields open to men were likewise open to women. 

Federal Aid to Education.—As one of the most effec¬ 
tive ways to strengthen the nation for the crisis of the 
Civil War and for future crises, Congress passed the 
Morrill Act in 1862. This law bestowed public land 
upon a single college in every state, and required that 
agriculture and military' training, as well as the arts 
and sciences, should be taught in every one of the insti¬ 
tutions thus assisted. In some states institutions al¬ 
ready established were the recipients of the magnificent 
bounty, 30,000 acres of western lands for every Senator 
and Representative representing the state in Congress; 
in other states new institutions were started. State Uni¬ 
versities, wherever these existed, secured the federal 
gift in preference to private institutions. From this 
time on, the state universities, such as those in Wis¬ 
consin, Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Minnesota, Ne¬ 
braska, Missouri, Kansas, Texas, California, and Wash¬ 
ington, made great progress. In 1917 the government 
again passed an important act for federal assistance to 
education, when it appropriated money in aid of voca¬ 
tional schools. 

The Chautauqua Circles. — Movements to bring edu¬ 
cation home to the masses, such as the lecture system, 
the newspaper, and the magazines, were powerfully sup¬ 
plemented in 1874 when the Chautauqua movement was 
inaugurated by Lewis Miller and Bishop Vincent of 
the Methodist Episcopal Church. The “ Chautauqua ” 
idea meant the formation of local “ circles ” in towns 
and cities for reading and study, according to carefully 
arranged programs. Hundreds and then thousands of 
“ circles ” were formed. To supplement these a sum- 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 387 


mer session was held on beautiful Lake Chautauqua, in 
western New York, where lectures and short courses 
of instruction were given to thousands of people. Now 
the “ Chautauqua ” idea includes the holding of these 
assemblies for summer lectures and entertainment in 
many different parts of the country. 

Literary Development. — By the middle of the nine¬ 
teenth century America had produced her own brilliant 
group of authors, novelists and descriptive writers, such 
as James Fenimore Cooper, Washington Irving, Na¬ 
thaniel Hawthorne, and Edgar Allan Poe; poets such 
as John Greenleaf Whittier, Henry Wadsworth Long¬ 
fellow, Ralph Waldo Emerson, William Cullen Bryant, 
and James Russell Lowell; historians such as William 
H. Prescott, George Bancroft, John L. Motley, and 
Francis Parkman; and humorists, such as Oliver Wen¬ 
dell Holmes. At the entrance to the twentieth century 
literature could boast of such names as William Dean 
Howells, Bret Harte, Henry James, Francis Marion 
Crawford, and Edith Wharton among writers of fiction; 
Sidney Lanier, Eugene Field, James Whitcomb Riley, 
and Walt Whitman among poets; Samuel L. Clemens 
(Mark Twain), the humorist; and Henry Adams, James 
Ford Rhodes, Edward Channing, John Fiske, and John 
Bach McMaster among historians. 

THE SETTLEMENT OF THE WEST 

General View. — The building of the new lines of 
transportation beyond the Mississippi had been far in 
advance of the needs of time, with a view to the future. 
After 1865 population pushed beyond the Mississippi 
very rapidly. Says one writer: “ Living men, not very 
old yet, have seen the Indians on the war-path, the 


388 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


buffaloes stopping the trains, the cowboy driving the 
cattle, the herder watching his sheep, the government 
irrigation dam, and the automobile — have seen every 
one of these slides which progress puts for a moment 
into its magic lantern and removes to replace with a 
new one.” 

New States. — Nevada, which w r as at the first a part 
of the territory of Utah, was made into a separate ter¬ 
ritory, and then, near the close of the Civil War, into 
a state, although at the time it had only about 40,000 
inhabitants. President Lincoln realized that this pop¬ 
ulation was! smaller than that usually required of a 
new state, but he was anxious to secure another state to 
ratify the thirteenth amendment against slavery. For 
this reason he signed the bill taking Nevada into the 
LTnion. 

Nebraska, the next new state, the terminus of the 
Union Pacific Railroad, owed her development almost 
entirely to the new railroad. She, too, when admitted 
into the Union, had a population of only 40,000. 

Colorado had practically no population at all until 
the discovery of the gold and silver mines within her 
borders. After the Civil War settlers began to come 
in large numbers, and, when admitted into the Union 
in the Centennial Year of 1876, she had a population 
of at least 100,000. 

North Dakota and South Dakota began to attract 
attention at the time of the construction of the Northern 
Pacific Railroad. This second Pacific Railroad was 
brought to completion in the late seventies and the 
early eighties. It extended from Duluth on Lake Su¬ 
perior to Helena, Montana, and in the early nineties 
reached Tacoma on Puget Sound. Within the decade of 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 389 

the eighties 800,000 people took up their residence along 
its route. Carved out of the domains of the once power¬ 
ful Sioux Indians, North and South Dakota were ad¬ 
mitted into the Union in 1889. 

Montana and Washington, farther west, along the 
western part of the Northern Pacific Railroad, received 
statehood at the same time as the two Dakotas. The 
next year came Wyoming and Idaho, and in 1896 Utah. 

Oklahoma. — Oklahoma, a part of the Indian Terri¬ 
tory which Congress had formed west of the Mississippi 
in 1834, was a very rich section, to the Indians “ the 
beautiful land.” For more than a half a century the 
federal government faithfully warded off the “ land- 
grabbers ” from its boundaries, in its efforts to protect 
the Indians and to preserve their lands intact. Chang¬ 
ing its policy in 1889, the United States bought the 
lands from the native tribes and threw them open to 
settlement. Fifty thousand people waited on the boun¬ 
dary line, ready to rush in at the appointed signal and 
win farms for themselves under the Homestead Law. 
“ Whole outfits for towns, including portable houses, 
were shipped by rail, and individual families, in pictur¬ 
esque, primitive, white-covered wagons, journeyed for¬ 
ward, stretching out for miles in an unbroken line. . . . 
Men on horseback and on foot, in every conceivable 
vehicle, sought homes with the utmost speed, and be¬ 
fore nightfall town sites were laid out for several thou¬ 
sand inhabitants.” By three o’clock in the afternoon 
of the opening day the town of Guthrie was completely 
laid out, with four business streets lined with shops and 
offices installed in tents. There was a bank and a 
daily paper, and by four o’clock a city council had been 
elected. When the state of Oklahoma, which included 


390 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


all the territory of Oklahoma and the rest of Indian 
Territory, was admitted into the Union in 1907, the 
population was beyond 1,000,000. 

Arizona and New Mexico. — The admission of Ariz¬ 
ona and New Mexico added to the sisterhood of states 
in 1912 the last parcel of territory save Alaska within 
the continental limits of the United States. A federal 
government, which in 125 years had expanded from 
13 to 48 states and had at the same time succeeded in 
preserving its original form of government with little 
change, certainly proved the wisdom of its founders. 

The Indians. — The rapid filling up of the western 
lands brought home to the government the problem of 
the Indians. They had been living on reservations, 
from which the whites were excluded. They were not 
citizens, ordinary laws were'not for them, and Uncle 
Sam furnished them with food, tools, and medicine, and 
held all their riches in trust for them, including their 
lands. They did not have to work. Impressed with 
the evils of such a system, which encouraged laziness, 
drunkenness, and lack of ambition, and actually brought 
about a decline in civilization, Congress in 1887 autho¬ 
rized the President from time to time, as he saw fit, to 
break up the reservations, distribute the land to the 
heads of the families In the tribe, and declare the 
members of the tribe citizens. Under the law a number 
of the leading tribes have now attained ownership and 
management of their lands, full citizenship, and the 
control of their own affairs. 

FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

The Alabama Claims. — For her part in fitting out 
the Alabama and other warships of the Confederate 


POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 391 

States of America, the United States after 1865 called 
Great Britain to strict account. Arbitration was de¬ 
clined, and angry words were exchanged on both sides, 
but at last the two nations submitted the case to a 
court of arbitration at Geneva, Switzerland. By the 
award, which was in general favorable to the United 
States, Great Britain was forced to admit her wrong, 
to express her “ regret,” and to pay to the United States 
$15,000,000 in gold. Friends of peace the world over 
rejoiced at this object lesson of the value of peace¬ 
ful arbitration as a means of settling disputes between 
great nations. 

Mexico. — While the hands of the government at 
Washington were tied by the Civil War, 1861-1865, 
France invaded the neighboring sister republic of Mex¬ 
ico, crushed out the republican government of the native 
inhabitants, and on its ruins set up a monarchy under 
Maximilian of Austria as Emperor. The will of the 
people of the country was over-ridden, and in its place 
substituted that of the foreign emperor, whose sole sup¬ 
port was the bayonets of French soldiers. The Monroe 
Doctrine was at stake. France refused to listen to vari¬ 
ous hints from Washington that she withdraw, but 
heeded when after the hostilities of the Civil War had 
ceased she saw 50,000 American bayonets gleaming on 
the northern banks of the Rio Grande. The French 
soldiers left Mexico; and, deprived of their support, 
Alaximilian was captured and executed by the Mexi¬ 
cans, and his government destroyed. The United States 
was gratified at what she deemed a highly successful ap¬ 
plication of the Monroe Doctrine. 

The Purchase of Alaska. — The victorious Union 
gladly extended the limits of the ocean-bound republic 


392 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 

by the purchase of Alaska from Russia, two years after 
the close of the Civil War, for $7,200,000. The addition 
to the national domain was popularly ridiculed as “Wal- 
russia,” “ Our Great National Ice House,” etc. The 
jibes now seem absurd in view of the fact that down 
to the present the total value of Alaska’s products 
has reached over $500,000,000. Other schemes of ter¬ 
ritorial annexation, for example in the West Indies, were 
brought to the front at about the same time, but they 
came to naught. 

The Monroe Doctrine Again. — One would suppose 
that after the experience of the French occupation of 
Mexico, the United States would naturally be jealous 
of what the nations of Europe did or proposed to do 
in the countries of South America. It is a matter of 
no little surprise, therefore, that in the decade of the 
eighties, while the Americans were working away fever¬ 
ishly at trans-continental railroads, French capitalists 
went on, unmolested and unchallenged, in the construc¬ 
tion of an inter-oceanic canal across the. Isthmus of 
Panama between the Atlantic and the Pacific. The 
completion and the control of this waterway by French 
citizens would almost surely have brought about in¬ 
fringements of the Monroe Doctrine. The enterprise, 
however, was never completed. Somewhat later, when 
Britain in 1895 seemed to be on the point of taking 
advantage of Venezuela on the northern shores of South 
America, in a boundary dispute between British Guiana 
and Venezuela, the United States interposed and forced 
England to arbitrate the matter. This was another 
highly popular application of the Monroe Doctrine, re¬ 
calling that against France in Mexico after 1865. 














































































































































POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 393 


Suggestive Questions 

1. Compare Lincoln with Johnson, his successor. Explain 
what is meant by reconstruction after 1865? What is the 
thirteenth amendment of the Constitution? What did the 
United States do for the freed slaves? Why? On what con¬ 
ditions were the Southern States allowed back in the Union? 
What is impeachment? Why was President Johnson im¬ 
peached? Who were the Carpet-baggers? What was the 
Ku Klux Klan? 

2. Why were the Southern people poor after 1865? Why 
is cotton seed valuable? Why do the Southern people favor 
building up cotton manufacturing in the South? What is 
the disadvantage to the South of pinning all its faith on the 
single crop of cotton? Tell the story of Elberta peaches. 
Why was the ballot given the freed negroes after the war? 

3. What were the greenbacks? What is the meaning of 
free coinage of silver? When did Bryan fight for the presi¬ 
dency on a platform favoring free coinage of silver? Who 
defeated him? Why was it necessary to raise the rates of 
tariff during and after the Civil War? Name the Presidents 
from Lincoln to McKinley. Why did some people want the 
United States after 1865 to adopt a policy of ship subsidies? 

4. What do we mean by capital? By labor? Why are 
they often opposed to one another? What two laws did 
Congress pass to check the evils of organized capital? 

5. Sketch in general the progress of education before the 
Civil War; during the Civil War. What colleges for women 
have been built since 1865? What did the Morrill Act do 
for education? What is the Chautauqua movement? Name 
the authors prominent in the middle of the nineteenth cen¬ 
tury. Who were prominent writers in the latter half of the 
nineteenth century ? 

6. How did railroads tend to build up the West? Name 
the new states admitted into the Union after 1865. Describe 
the rush into Oklahoma, What was the reservation system 
for the Indians? Are any Indians now citizens? 

7. What were the Alabama Claims, and how were they 
settled? What trouble did the United States have with 


394 POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL QUESTIONS 


France over Mexico? Was it wise to purchase Alaska? What 
trouble did the United States have with Great Britain over 
Venezuela? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That it was a mistake to allow the negroes 
to vote after 1865. 

2. Resolved, That it is a mistake to give up the reserva¬ 
tion system for the Indians, and admit them into citizen¬ 
ship on the same basis as the Whites. (For material, write 
to your Congressman for reports of the United States Indian 
Commissioner on this subject.) 

Topics for Compositions 

1. The Southern States since 1865. 

2. The Settlement and Growth of Oklahoma. 

3. The Presidential Election of 1896. Halsey, Epochs, X, 
108-124; Stanwood, Presidency, 519-569. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The Indian Question. Leupp, The Indian; Jackson, 
Century of Dishonor. 

2. The Anarchists in Chicago in 1886. Halsey, Epochs, 
X, 57-63. 

3. The Purchase of. Alaska. Rhodes, United States, VI, 
211-214; Halsey, Epochs, IX, 98-105; Bruce, Expansion, 
166-186; Sparks, Expansion, 429-438. 

4. Thomas A. Edison. Lives by Dyer, and Rolt-Wheeler. 

5. Inventors and Inventions. Mowry, American Inven¬ 
tions and Inventors; lies, Inveyitors at Work, with Chapters 
on Discovery. 

Important Dates 

1862. The Morrill Act. 

1867. Purchase of Alaska. 

Books to Remember 

1. E. Stanwood, The Presidency. 

2. A. B. Hart, Ed., The American Nation, A History. 


CHAPTER XXI 


THE WAR WITH SPAIN 

HOSTILITIES AND RELATED PROBLEMS 

The Opening of the War. — The island of Cuba, “ the 
pearl of the Antilles,” was still under the power of 
Spain in 1895, but was oppressed and unhappy. In 
that year she broke out into open revolution against 
Spain, as she had done many a time in the past. The 
contest dragged on for three years, with the United 



The Battleship “Maine” Entering Havana Harbor 

States remaining neutral, though her citizens were in 
sympathy with the Cubans. An event of the year 1898 
led the Cubans to freedom. The American battleship, 
Maine, on a friendly visit in the harbor of Havana, 
Cuba, was blown up by an explosion that took the 
lives of 265 of her officers and crew. Was it an accident 
or was it the work of unfriendly Spaniards, incensed 
at the open sympathy of the United States for the 

395 













396 THE WAR WITH SPAIN 

Cubans? Swiftly succeeding events pushed the United 
States and Spain into war before the excitement of 
the Americans could be assuaged, and before the re¬ 
sponsibility for the explosion could be determined. On 
the historic 19th of April, the anniversary of the Battle 


T 



The Maine Memorial in New York 


of Concord and Lexington and of the shedding of the 
first blood of the Civil War at Baltimore, Congress 
passed a resolution demanding that Spain withdraw 
from Cuba. This of course meant war. 














THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


397 


Hostilities. — A few weeks later Commodore, later 
Admiral, Dewey, who had been with Farragut at Mobile 
Bay in 1864, electrified the nation by the news that on 
May 1, his fleet had met and destroyed a Spanish fleet 
in Manila Bay, in the Philippine Islands. Three hun¬ 
dred and eighty-one Spaniards w r ere killed in the terrific 
encounter, and not one American. Captain, later Ad¬ 
miral, Sampson, and Commodore, later Admiral, Schley, 
at the head of another American fleet blockaded the 
Spanish ports of Cuba, and utterly destroyed a Spanish 
fleet that attempted to escape from the harbor of San¬ 
tiago, Cuba. The news reached the United States on 
July 4. In two weeks more the American army, led 
by General Shatter, fought some sharp engagements 
with the Spanish forces around Santiago, and forced 
the surrender of the city. In another month Porto Rico 
fell without any resistance at all, and at about the same 
time the city of Manila, in the Philippines. 

The Treaty of Peace. — By the treaty of Paris, signed 
by the belligerents late in 1898, Spain forever withdrew 
from Cuba, and ceded Porto Rico and the Philippine 
Islands to the United States. For the latter group 
the Americans paid $20,000,000. 

The Hawaiian and Samoan Islands. — Shortly after 
the treaty of peace was signed in 1898, the United 
States, (at the request of the people of the islands them¬ 
selves) annexed the Hawaiian Islands, which Captain 
Cook had called the Sandwich Islands. In 1900 came 
the addition of a portion of the Samoan Islands in the 
South Pacific. 

The Meaning of the New Annexations. — Cuba, Porto 
Rico, the Philippines, the Hawaiian Islands, the Samoan 
Islands! The list of the new possessions and responsi- 


398 


THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


bilities was a long one. None of them was large in 
geographical area, but their possession meant that the 
United States had ceased to be an ocean-bound republic, 
and had taken upon herself new burdens in world 
politics. 






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Hawaiian Islands 


The Annexations Approved. President McKinley. — 

The question of the wisdom of this step was threshed 
out before the people in the presidential campaign of 
1900, in which the decision was for going on with the 
experiment. President McKinley, who stood for the 
annexations, was re-elected by a decisive majority. 
He took office for a second time on March 4, 1900, but 
was shot to death by a crazy assassin at the Pan-Ameri¬ 
can Exposition at Buffalo, New York, within six months 
after the beginning of his second term. He was sin¬ 
cerely mourned as a broad-minded and successful 
statesman. 


























THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


399 


Three New Presidents. — Three new presidents, 
Theodore Roosevelt, 1901-1909, William H. Taft, 1909- 
1913, and Woodrow Wilson, 1913-21, followed in order, 
without effecting any marked changes in national tend¬ 
encies till the year 1917. In this latter year the entry 
of the United States into the World War ushered in a 
new era in American politics, the end of which is not 
vet. 

Cuba. — Although the United States had promised 
in its declaration concerning Cuba, April 19, 1898, to 



Theodore Roosevelt 


“ leave the government and control of the island to its 
people ,” it exerted a certain supervision over its des¬ 
tinies at first. The Cubans made a constitution for 
themselves, which was almost an exact copy of the 
Constitution of the United States; and added to it 
certain declarations, (1) that Cuba would never part 
with its independence to a foreign power or give a 











4C0 


THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


foreign power lodgment in the island, and (2) that 
the United States might have the right to intervene in 
Cuban affairs, “ for the preservation of Cuban inde¬ 
pendence, the maintenance of a government adequate 
for the protection of life, property, and individual 
liberty.” The new republic, under the protection of the 
United States, though disturbed at times by temporary 
upheavals, has had on the whole a happy history. This 
has been due in no small degree to the great prosperity 
of her sugar plantations and other agricultural interests, 
which have had full opportunity for development since 
her release from oppression. 



Porto Rico 


Porto Rico. — Porto Rico, unlike Cuba, became the 
property of the United States by the treaty of peace 
with Spain in 1898, and still belongs to her. There 
have been differences between the American governor 
and the natives in the lower house of the island 
legislature, but these have been adjusted. The progress 

















THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


401 


of education in the island, under American control, is 
an inspiring spectacle. When the troops of the United 
States first arrived there in 1898, there was but one 
building in the island erected solely for school purposes 
and only 26,000 pupils. After the lapse of seventeen 
years the number of school buildings was 375 and the 
total number of pupils 160,000. The foreign trade of 
the island, especially in sugar, has increased by leaps 
and bounds, like that of Cuba. Porto Rico has now 
attained the dignity of being a territory of the United 
States, which is generally regarded as the first step 
toward statehood. 

The Philippine Islands. — The settlement of the 
government of the Philippines was not so easy, as these 
islands were many in number and some were occupied 
by very backward races. At first the President judged it 
necessary to set up military rule in the islands, but this 
was soon superseded by civil government. The form of 
government has been changed from time to time to give 
the natives greater representation, till now they have a 
majority in both branches of the island legislature and 
fill most of the other offices. It is not generally believed 
that the time has yet come for the United States to 
grant independence to the islands. The promise of ulti¬ 
mate independence has been made, and the promise will 
be kept when the natives appear capable of self-govern¬ 
ment and self protection against any power that might 
seize them, unprotected by the United States. The 
chief city, Manila, and the surrounding islands, are 
very prosperous. 

Hawaii, the Samoan Islands, and Alaska. — The 

Hawaiian Islands, with a fine American civilization 
centered in the capital at Honolulu, are also now an 


402 


THE WAR WITH SPAIN 



American territory, ready for statehood at any time that 
Congress sees fit to grant it. To Alaska, also, as to 
the Hawaiian Islands and to Porto Rico, Congress has 






























THE WAR WITH SPAIN 403 

given a territorial government. The Samoan Islands 
are ruled by the President. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. Tell the story of the battleship, Maine. For what is 
Admiral Dewey famous? What news reached the United 
States, July 4, 1898? What territory came to the United 
States by the terms of the treaty of peace with Spain, 1898? 
What other territory was added to the country in the same 
year, and in 1900? What was the Pan-American Exposition? 
and what tragedy occurred there? What has the United 
States done to show its friendship for Cuba? for Porto Rico? 
for the Philippines? 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That it was a mistake to annex the Philip¬ 
pines. 

2. Resolved, That the Philippines should be granted inde¬ 
pendence. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Dewey’s May Day Victory in Manila. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The Philippine Islands. Sparks, Expansion , 439-452. 
Latane, World Power, 82-100 and 153-175. 

Important Dates 

1898. War w T ith Spain. 

Books to Remember 

1. J. W. Foster Century of American Diplomacy; and 
The Practice of Diplomacy . 


i 


CHAPTER XXII 


NEW QUESTIONS OF INTERNATIONAL 

IMPORTANCE 

/ 

1. THE PEACE MOVEMENT 

The First Congress at The Hague. — In the year, 
1899, at the call of the Czar of Russia, twenty-six 
nations, including the United States and the leading 
nations of Europe, came together in a great peace con¬ 
gress at The Hague, in Holland, to devise ways and 
means to lessen the number of wars and their cruelties. 
Tentative agreements, which various nations later rati¬ 
fied, were made concerning the laws of war on land and 
on sea. Some of the nations denounced the throwing of 
projectiles from balloons, the use of poisonous gases, 
and dumdum bullets. 

The Court of Arbitration at The Hague. — By far 

the greatest result of the Congress was the setting up of 
an international court at the Hague for the settlement 
of international disputes by arbitration. This unique 
tribunal has met from time to time, as called upon, 
in a beautiful peace palace at The Hague, which was the 
gift an American multi-millionaire, Andrew Carnegie. 
It had settled almost a score of international disputes 
down to the opening of the World War in 1914. The 
United States, which had already settled many ques¬ 
tions in international relations by arbitration, for ex- 

404 


IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 405 


ample the Alabama Claims against England, was quick 
to submit to the new court a financial dispute with 
Mexico, and one with England over the right to catch 
fish off the fishing banks in the waters of Newfoundland. 

Arbitration Treaties. — In addition, Presidents 
Roosevelt, Taft, and Wilson sought by treaties with 
various nations to extend the practice of arbitration. 
The Wilson treaties declared that “ all disputes ” (with 



The Peace Palace at The Hague 


these nations) “of every nature whatever ” should be 
submitted to a permanent international commission, 
which was to have one year in which to ascertain the 
facts in any particular case and make a report. By this 
delay of a year, called a “ diplomatic breathing spell/' 
as well as by the report of judicial investigation, it was 
confidently hoped that national passions would be cooled 














406 IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 


down and the matter under dispute viewed rationally. 
More than a score of such treaties were entered into by 
the United States. 

The Second Congress at The Hague. — As a cham¬ 
pion of peace President Roosevelt suggested the calling 
of a second congress at The Hague, but yielded the 
honor of extending the actual call to the Czar of Russia. 
The conference, attended this time by forty-four gov¬ 
ernments, assembled at The Hague in 1907. Other 
tentative agreements were made touching various rules 
of war. It was recommended that a third conference 
be held at The Hague in 1915, but because of the out¬ 
break of the World War in Europe in 1914 this was 
not convened. 


2. PAN-AMERICANISM 

The Pan-American Congresses. — One of the finest 
signs of the times in the diplomacy of the twentieth 
century is the growing spirit of brotherhood among the 
independent American republics. After its failure to 
attend the Panama Congress in 1825, the United States 
never again considered sending delegates to such a 
meeting till 1889, when at her own invitation a Pan- 
American Congress, that is, a Congress of all America, 
met in Washington. Three other such meetings have 
since been held in the leading capitals of South Amer¬ 
ica and Mexico, in each of which delegates from the 
United States have participated. High ideals of in¬ 
ternational relations have been worked out at these 
meetings on the subjects of law, business, and arbitra¬ 
tion. Today the Pan-American Union, which is a 
permanent organization of the North and South Amer- 


IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 407 

ican nations, has its home in the beautiful Pan- 
American Building in Washington. 

The Panama Canal. — Ever since the discovery of 
gold in California it had been the ardent desire of the 
United States to cut a canal across the Isthmus of 
Panama, to shorten the voyage between the Atlantic 
and the Pacific. French capitalists, as has been seen, 



Pan-American Building, Washington, D. C. 

had tried it earlier but failed. England held some 
vague territorial rights on the Central American Coast 
and in the Gulf of Mexico. Differences with the British 
over the canal were settled by treaty, and in 1903, 
under the initiative of President Roosevelt, the United 
States went to work with tremendous energy to dig the 







408 IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 


canal. The first vessel passed through it in 1913. The 
Canal Zone, which was fever-stricken and deadly 
seventy years ago when the Panama Railroad was put 
through, is today practically free from fever, thanks to 
the efforts of the sanitary engineers of the United States 
army. Yellow fever, which was found to be carried by 
mosquitoes, and other tropical fevers and ills have 
been overcome. The United States has expended almost 
$400,000,000 on the canal. 

Tolls at the Panama Canal. — There has been some 
dispute with England over the treaty right of the United- 
States to levy on British vessels canal tolls from which 
her own vessels are exempt. President Wilson and Con¬ 
gress decided that the meaning of the treaty was that 
the vessels of the two countries should pay the same tolls, 
and this is now the law. Possibly another Congress may 
enact unequal tolls for the vessels of the two nations, 
that is, exemption from tolls for the coastwise vessels 
of the United States but tolls for British vessels. 

The Canal Today. — For the past four years over 
2,000 vessels of commerce have passed through the 
big waterway annually. The yearly receipts total 
nearly $9,000,000, somewhat more than the cost of 
operation, which is about $6,500,000 per year. The in¬ 
terest on the investment of $400,000,000 at 4 per cent 
is $16,000,000, so that when all costs of operation have 
been met there is very little left to pay the interest on 
the original outlay. Statesmen do not dream that the 
government will ever get back any of the $400,000,000, 
but they rest content with the great shortening of ocean 
routes, which benefits all the world. 

Venezuela Blockaded. — In 1902-1903 Germany, 
Great Britain, and Italy instituted a peaceful blockade 


IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 409 

of the ports of Venezuela, in order to force that delin¬ 
quent South American state to pay its debts to certain 
citizens of the blockading countries. Was this con¬ 
trary to the Monroe Doctrine? President Roosevelt 
took the position that it was not, so long as the Euro¬ 
pean powers acquired no territory from Venezuela. The 
blockade went on for a year, and then the besieged 
state agreed to arbitration and met its obligations. 

Santo Domingo. — Although the Monroe Doctrine 
had not been violated by the Venezuelan blockade, the 
President the next year decided that the states of 
Europe must not be allowed to repeat the exploit. 
President Roosevelt took charge of the custom houses 
of the negro republic of Santo Domingo, which was 
then being hard pressed by creditors in Europe, and 
appointed a financial receiver through whom the 
finances of the island are still administered. American 
intervention there has been successful. The annual 
revenue of Santo Domingo has risen from $700,000 to 
five times that amount. Interest on the national debt 
is being met, the principal will be paid many years 
before it is due, and, what is of utmost importance, 
110,000 school children crowd the schools, which were 
attended by only 12,000 children before the United 
States took charge. Wherever national duty imposes 
on them tasks of colonial administration, be it in the 
Orient or in the Occident, Americans at once gather 
the youth of the land which is placed in their charge, 
into public schools like those of the United States. The 
public school is a store-house of national well-being 
for all peoples. 

Nicaragua and Hayti. — Nicaragua was enabled to 
meet its financial obligations in Europe by the action 


410 IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 

of the United States, which paid to it $3,000,000 in 
return for the right to construct, whenever it should 
desire, and to fortify, a canal through the country from 
the Atlantic to the Pacific. The money received for the 
concession must be used in paying off the Nicaraguan 
public debt, with the approval of the United States. 
To ward off European intervention in Hayti, the United 
States, by treaty, now supervises the native finances as 
in Santo Domingo, and directs the development of the 
resources of the island. 

The Danish West Indies. — To prevent a possible 
cession of the Danish West Indies by Denmark to a 
European power, the United States in 1917, under the 
lead of President Wilson, purchased the islands for 
$25,000,000, and re-named them the Virgin Islands, the 
name originally selected by Columbus, who discovered 
them. The harbor on the island of St. Thomas, which 
is the most important island in the group, is the finest 
harbor in the West Indies, and its possession gives the 
United States considerable advantage for the protection 
of the Panama Canal. 

Mexico. — How to maintain the rights and claims of 
American citizens in Mexico, which were often disre¬ 
garded, and also to prevent the necessity of vigorous 
action by European nations in enforcing their rights 
in that country, was one of the leading problems 
of President Wilson. The problem was all the more 
complicated because many of the rights and claims 
of Americans in Mexico had been disregarded by 
the Mexicans. In the turmoil over the presidency, 
which had existed since 1911 in the unfortunate re¬ 
public, the United States steadfastly refused to make 
war on Mexico. Its dignity, however, required it to 


IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 411 

send troops to Vera Cruz in 1914, in order to force a 
salute to the American flag, which the Mexicans had 
dishonored. There were casualties on both sides and 
war seemed certain. 

Mediation by the “ A.B.C.” Powers. — One of the 

finest fruits of Pan-Americanism now showed itself. 
The three leading powers of South America, Argentina, 
Brazil, and Chili, — the “ A.B.C.” powers — brought the 
two sides together in conference at Niagara Falls, 
where they came to an amicable agreement. It is 
a hopeful and encouraging sign that the United States 
has consented to the association of the leading powers 
of South America with herself in handling purely Amer¬ 
ican questions. The old complaint that the Monroe 
Doctrine means the subordination of the South Ameri¬ 
can powers to the United States no longer has any 
point. The jealousy in South America of the leadership 
of North America disappears year by year, before the 
rising tide of international goodwill among the Amer¬ 
ican states. This is the true Pan-Americanism. 

3. RELATIONS WITH THE FAR EAST 

Japan.— Japan and the United States have in gen¬ 
eral been on the friendliest of terms ever since the ships 
of the United States navy, under the command of Ad¬ 
miral Perry, went to Japanese waters in the middle of 
the nineteenth century and induced the Mikado to throw 
open the doors of his country to western 1 civilization. 
Twice, however, in the early part of the twentieth cen¬ 
tury relations with Japan grew strained. In Roosevelts 
presidency the state of California was about to pass 
legislation forcing the children of the Japanese in the 


412 IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 


state to attend separate schools from those attended 
by the whites. Under President Wilson the same state 
proposed to forbid certain foreigners, including the 
Japanese, to hold land in the state for agricultural 
purposes. In the one case the earnest remonstrances of 
the President induced the state to desist, but in the 
other the wishes of the President were not regarded. 

China and the Open Door. — It has been the desire 
of the United States to preserve the independence and 
territorial integrity of China, against the efforts of 
certain powers to carve out for themselves in Chinese 
territory “ spheres of influence,” in each of which a 
particular power was to enjoy special commercial privi¬ 
leges. President McKinley stood for the policy of the 
“ open door in China,” which meant equal privileges to 
all nations, special privileges to none. 

China and the Boxer Indemnity. — In 1900 China 
was forced to agree to pay $300,000,000 to the leading 
powers of the world, as an indemnity for injuries done 
their citizens by riotous Chinese during the “ Boxer 
Rebellion ” of that year in China. The $24,000,000, 
which was the share of the United States in the huge 
sum, was so far in excess of her actual losses that she 
returned to China $13,000,000; and now, out of this 
returned money, which is one of the most unique funds 
of international goodwill and fair play in the history of 
the world, China every year sends hundreds of her 
picked boys and girls to study in American schools.and 
colleges. 

China and Dollar Diplomacy. — Under President 
Taft the national government began to use the efforts of 
American ministers and ambassadors abroad to advance 
the financial interests of American business men. 


IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 413 

This was dubbed u dollar diplomacy.” The immediate 
object of the President was to secure for the business 
interests of his country the right to lend large sums of 
money to China for the construction of railroads and 
other internal improvements. The terms of the pro¬ 
posed loan were very hard for China, and President 
Wilson, who succeeded President Taft, renounced “ dol¬ 
lar diplomacy ” and ended his country’s efforts to 
share in the loan to China. In 1920, a similar propo¬ 
sition was put forward to lend financial assistance to 
China upon more favorable terms. This time the United 
States had a part in the proposal. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. What was the First Congress at the Hague? What 
was the most important result of this Congress? What is 
arbitration? How does resorting to arbitration differ from 
making a treaty? What can you say of the Second Con¬ 
gress at the Hague? 

2. What is Pan-Americanism? The Pan-American Union? 
Whose name is most closely associated with the Panama 
Canal? What is the Panama toll question? Did the Euro¬ 
pean powers violate the Monroe Doctrine in Venezuela in 
1902-1903. Tell the story of the custom houses in Santo 
Domingo, supervised by the United States. What annexa¬ 
tion of territory was made by the United States, when 
Wilson was President? Why? What are the “A.B.C.” 
powers, and what have they done for the United States? 

3. What is the Open Door in China? What was the Boxer 
Rebellion, and what was the part of the United States in put¬ 
ting it down? Explain “ dollar diplomacy.” 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the United States should consent to 
arbitrate every question of dispute with foreign countries. 
Latane, World Power , 242-255. 


414 IMPORTANT INTERNATIONAL QUESTIONS 


2. Resolved, That the United States should express re¬ 
gret to Colombia for the manner in which the latter power 
lost Panama, previous to the building of the Panama Canal. 
(Write to your senators or representatives for material on 
this subject.) 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Explain to a European why the United States was 
anxious to construct the Panama Canal. 

2. Pan-Americanism. (Write to the Director of the Pan- 
American Union for material on this subject.) 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The Panama Canal. Halsey, Epochs, X, 169-176; 
Latane, World Power, 204-224. 

2. The Monroe Doctrine since 1898. Latane, World 
Power, 255-269. 

Important Dates 

1899. First Peace Congress at the Hague. 

1913. Panama Canal completed. 

1917. Virgin Islands annexed. 


CHAPTER XXIII 


CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT 

CAPITVL AND LABOR 

Control of the Trusts. — One of the most important 
factors in the government of the United States in the 
opening years of the twentieth century, has been its 
changed attitude toward large business enterprises. The 
Sherman Anti-Trust Act, which had been placed on the 
statute books in the closing years of the preceding cen¬ 
tury, now' at last began to be enforced, and w^as 
strengthened by a new law. Numerous trusts, includ¬ 
ing the Standard Oil Company, were ordered broken 
up by the courts for their illegal interference with com¬ 
petition in interstate trade. Manufacturers of impure 
meat, foods, and drugs, w r ere refused the right to ship 
their products from state to state in interstate com¬ 
merce. In 1914 a Federal Trade Commission was set 
up to watch for unfair competition in commerce, to 
make investigations into the large corporations, and 
to hold public hearings and make public reports. 

Labor. — Organized labor, which has grown stronger 
from year to year, has on the whole succeeded in main¬ 
taining the rights and dignity of labor against the on¬ 
slaughts of organized capital. There is a Federal Board 
of Mediation and Conciliation, which has succeeded 
by conferences in preventing many a strike; and 

415 


416 


CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT 


under it also a federal board of arbitrators has success¬ 
fully arbitrated numerous other strike disputes. Com¬ 
binations of laborers, in labor unions, which under the 
Sherman Anti-Trust Law were punished by the courts 
when guilty of restraint of trade, just like organized 
capital, were finally declared by Congress not to be 
acting illegally. The trust laws were held to be for 
the control of capital alone. 

CONSEr VATION 

Roosevelt and the West. — As a young man just out 

of Harvard College, Theodore Roosevelt spent several 
years on a western ranch, where he gained a wonderful 
physical constitution and at the same time a keen in¬ 
sight into Western history and conditions. No president 
was ever in closer touch with the entire W T est. 

The Reclamation Act of 1902. — Under his leader¬ 
ship as President Congress passed a Reclamation Act, 
which set aside the proceeds of the sale of public lands 
m sixteen states as a special fund with which to irrigate 
arid lands in these states. Any proceeds from the sale of 
irrigated lands were to be added to the fund. Great irri¬ 
gation projects costing in all $100,000,000 have been 
completed, and millions of acres of useless land re¬ 
claimed for useful cultivation. 

The Forests and Mines. — Congress has also author¬ 
ized the government to acquire and preserve vast 
stretches of forest lands in the East as well as in the 
West. Federal forest reserves are scattered by the score 
over the entire Union. The reservation of government 
mineral lands from sale to private ownership has also 
gone on to some extent. This is opposed in some quar- 


CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT 


417 


ters as hostile to progress, the claim being made that 
these lands would be developed faster under private 
ownership and control. 

The House of Governors. — On the assumption that 
the conservation of natural resources was blocked in 
some cases by the inharmonious action of the states, 
President Roosevelt called the governors of the states 
to meet in conference with him at the White House, to 
consider what could be done to improve the situation. 
This gathering, which is called the “ House of Gover¬ 
nors,” and is now convened annually by the governors 
without the participation of the president, has accom¬ 
plished much in bringing about uniformity of action 
among the states on such subjects as lie within the prov¬ 
ince of the states. The governors discuss and then rec¬ 
omend to their state legislatures uniform laws for 
forest preservation, improvement of factory conditions, 
the prevention of child labor, uniformity in marriage and 
divorce laws, etc. 

FOUR AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION 

The National Income Tax. — Most fortunately from 
the point of view of the needs of the national treasury, 
an amendment to the Constitution was passed in 1913 
empowering Congress to levy an income tax, without 
apportioning it among the states according to population, 
as demanded by the Constitution. Without such a tax 
it is difficult to see how the vast sums needed for prose¬ 
cuting the war against Germany could have been raised. 
The tax-collectors reported in 1921 that 4,000,000 people 
were paying income taxes to the United States, and 
that one-half of these people had incomes of $2,000 per 


418 


CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT 


year or more. The officials estimated that there were 
20,000 millionaires in the country. Two men had an 
annual income above $3,000,000, 28 above $2,000,000, 
and 162 above $1,000,000. 

Popular Election of United States Senators. — By 

the seventeenth amendment United States Senators are 
now elected by the people, instead of by the state legis¬ 
latures. The new method gives more direct representa¬ 
tion to the people. 

National Prohibition. — The eighteenth amendment 
brought in national prohibition of the manufacture and 
sale of intoxicating liquors in the United States. This 
was one of the most sweeping reforms ever effected in 
the history of the country. 

Woman’s Suffrage. — In 1920, after a long and bitter 
struggle, the nineteenth amendment to the Constitution 
gave suffrage to women, and in this year the women of 
the land voted for president for the first time in every 
state. In several states this had been allowed for some 
years by state action. Also in many states women had 
been privileged to vote in state and municipal elections 
before this date. 

For seventy-five years there had been adherents of 
this reform. Their first success was scored in 1869, 
when the territory of Wyoming enfranchised women 
on the same terms as men. A quarter of a' century 
passed before any state followed this example. Then, 
beginning in 1893 with the action of Colorado, state 
after state took the step of granting women the fran¬ 
chise. The placing of woman’s suffrage and prohibi¬ 
tion in the national Constitution may be looked upon 
as in large measure due to the spirit of reform arising 
out of the World War. 


CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT 


410 


CHANGES IN THE STATES 

The Initiative, Referendum, and Recall. — In the 

last quarter of a century, the people have secured 
greater and more direct control of their state gov¬ 
ernments. The initiative is a device by which a pre¬ 
scribed number of voters can propose laws by petition. 
If the voters accept such proposals in popular elec¬ 
tion, they become laws. In the states which have the 
referendum, certain measures may not become a law 
merely upon passage in the state legislature, but must 
be referred to the people for their acceptance before 
becoming laws. The recall gives the right to the voters 
to remove a public official from office at any time by 
an election. State officials are thus made very care¬ 
ful not to make serious mistakes, lest the people de¬ 
mand their removal. The people of many states, 
especially in the West, now have all three popular 
rights, the initiative, the referendum, and the recall. 

Direct Primaries. — Until lately political parties have 
nominated men to run on their party tickets as candi¬ 
dates for office, by a party convention or meeting of del¬ 
egates sent by the voters to represent them in the con¬ 
vention. But it was alleged that this small assemblage 
of men in the convention was comparatively easy to 
corrupt, and that the power of the chairman of the 
convention could be, and in many cases was, used for 
or against this or that candidate. State after state did 
away with the system, by instituting direct primaries. 
These are meetings of voters, who, instead of sending 
delegates to express their choice concerning candidates 
in a convention, themselves express their own choice 
as to who should be the candidates, by their own vote 


420 


CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT 


in the primary itself. Thus the convention, which may 
be regarded as a secondary meeting, was no longer nec¬ 
essary, since the candidates were named in the primary, 
or first meeting of voters. 

Commission Form of Government. — When Galves¬ 
ton, Texas, was destroyed by a tidal wave in the year 
1900, the stricken people abandoned their old form of 
government, with its mayor and councilmen; and for 
the sake of immediate efficiency, with the permission 
of the legislature of the state, they gave over the man¬ 
agement of the affairs of the city to commissioners. 
One, with no additional powers, was called the mayor. 
These men made the city ordinances, and carried on 
the business of the city. So successful was the ex¬ 
periment, that Des Moines, Iowa, followed the ex¬ 
ample with certain slight changes, and later other cities 
fell into line. In 1916 about four hundred cities and 
towns were under the commission form of government. 

The City Manager Plan. — It soon appeared that the 
five commissioners could not adequately attend to all the 
details of the city administration. A single expert was 
needed, who could be attracted only by a large salary. 
Therefore in 1908 the plan w r as evolved of having a 
“ city manager,” who should be the general director 
of the affairs of the city. He w T as to be chosen by the 
commissioners, each of whom was to remain in charge 
of a single department of the city affairs and collec¬ 
tively make the city ordinances. More than two hun¬ 
dred cities, including Dayton and Springfield, Ohio, now 
have city managers. Cleveland has also adopted the 
system, to go into effect on January 1, 1924. 


CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT 


421 


Suggestive Questions 

1. Why is it necessary for the United States to exercise 
supervision over the trusts? What is the Federal Board of 
Mediation and Conciliation? 

2. What is meant by conservation? What was the Re¬ 
clamation Act of 1902? Describe the House of Governors, 
and what it tries to do? 

3. What four amendments have been put into the Consti¬ 
tution since 1913? What does each seek to accomplish? 

4. Describe the initiative, referendum and the recall, and 
give arguments in favor of these measures. What are direct 
primaries? What evils in political life do they seek to meet? 
What is commission form of municipal government? The 
city manager plan? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the commission form of government, 
as modified by the city manager plan, should be introduced 
into every city of the United States. Munro, The Govern¬ 
ment of the United States. 

2. Resolved, That direct primaries are superior to the 
convention system for nominating officials for office. Mer- 
riam, Primary Elections. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Conservation of National Resources. Latane, World 
Power. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. Election of United States Senators. Munro, Govern¬ 
ment of the United States. 

Important Dates 

1902. Reclamation Act. 

1920. Woman suffrage amendment. 

Books to Remember 

1. B. T. Washington, Up From Slavery. 

2. W. E. B. DuBois, The Soul of a Black Man. 


CHAPTER XXIV 


THE WORLD WAR 

THREE YEARS OF WAR IN EUROPE, 1914-1917 

I 

The Outbreak of the War. — In the summer of 1914, 
when the news spread over the world that on June 28, 
the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne had been mur¬ 
dered on the streets of Serajevo, in the little Balkan 
state of Bosnia, which was under the control of Austria- 
Hungary, civilization everywhere trembled in suspense 
and fear, lest the long-dreaded European War might 
grow out of the incident. The issue of peace or war 
hung in the balance for an entire month, while the heads 
of the European states, kings, czars, emperors, and 
presidents, and their diplomats struggled to reach an 
agreement that would keep the peace. Although the 
dastardly deed had been committed on her own soil, 
Austria-Hungary pointed out that the assassin was a 
subject of Servia and a member of a Servian secret 
society. She therefore called upon that state to suppress 
the society and punish the conspirators in her national 
courts. While consenting to do all this, Servia re¬ 
jected the further demand that she allow the Austrians 
to be present at the proposed trial and participate in 
its proceedings. Servia could not acquiesce in this de¬ 
mand and maintain her own dignity and sovereignty as 
a nation. Knowing that Germany was on her side, 

422 


THE WORLD WAR 423 

Austria-Hungary then declared war on Servia; and 
when Russia armed to protect her brother Slavs in Ser¬ 
via, Germany hurled a declaration of war against her, 
and followed it up in a day or two by a similar dec¬ 
laration against France, Russia’s ally. England, fear¬ 
ful for her own shores, if Belgium and^ France fell under 
German control, rushed to the defense of Belgium and 
of France, and sent a counter declaration of war against 
Germany, when the armies of the latter power, in plain 
violation of treaty promises, invaded Belgium on the 
way to France. 

Italy's Choice. — For some years Italy had been 
yoked up with Austria and Germany, in what was called 
the Triple Alliance. If she continued to stand with 
her old allies, it would take a million French soldiers 
to guard the southern frontiers of France against her. 
Great was the relief of the French when Italy broke 
from the Austrians and Germans, and thus made it safe 
for France to transfer her southern army to the east 
to meet the Germans. This decision of the Italians to 
take the side of France and England and Russia was 
one of the great factors that led to the final beating 
back of the German hordes from France. Turkey and 
Bulgaria threw in their lot with the Germans and 
Austrians. 

Belgium. — The first, the worst stricken, and the 
most long-suffering victim of the ravages of the Ger¬ 
mans was Belgium. She could have saved herself by 
allowing the Germans a free passage across her terri¬ 
tory into France. This she pluckily refused to do, and 
rather than submit, she accepted the destruction of her 
cities and towns, the burning and pillaging of her art 
treasures, colleges, libraries, and factories, the wresting 


424 


THE WORLD WAR 


from her of millions in forced loans, the cruel murder of 
many of her leading citizens, the torture of her old men, 
women, and children, and the deportation of thousands 
of her people for enforced labor in Germany. The his¬ 
tory of civilization would be searched in vain for a 
greater sacrifice than hers in the name and for the sake 
of honor. 

France. — The admiration of the world was instant 
and overwhelming for France’s uncomplaining accep¬ 
tance of the war that was thrust upon her, for her 
calm self-control in the face of the danger, for her dash 
and bravery, and for her wonderful skill in the art of 
war. A large part of her iron and coal mines, thousands 
of her factories, and many of her richest manufacturing 
towns on her eastern frontier, fell into the hands of the 
invaders. France raised millions of soldiers, and sac¬ 
rificed thousands of her sons every month, but she 
never yielded. 

England. — England, which had never been success¬ 
fully invaded from the continent of Europe since the 
Normans came over to her shores from France in 1066 
to build up a new monarchy, now again found com¬ 
parative safety and security because she was an island. 
Only London and certain Eastern towns felt the rav¬ 
ages of bombs cast from the German airplanes above 
them; and here and there her eastern shore was struck 
by a few stray shots from a German warship that sud¬ 
denly appeared on the sea and as suddenly disappeared. 
Her colonial empire, that seemed to be her greatest 
weakness, in the crisis proved one of her strongest sup¬ 
ports, for Canada, 'Australia, South Africa, India, and 
her other possessions remained true to her and sent to 
her assistance millions of men and money. She never 


THE WORLD WAR 


425 


lost control of the way to India; and to and from every 
one of her colonies, scattered as these were in every 
direction over the sea, the sea lanes remained open. 
Her navy was everywhere, and was successful. 

Germany. — Germany, the strongest of the Central 
Powers opposing the Allies, was an over-populated 
country. She frantically desired world markets, and 
was equally desirous of colonies, although she well knew 
that these could only be secured by a fight. She pos¬ 
sessed a mighty army and navy, and confident of her 
power was forever dreaming of the conquest of the 
world. Her plan was to crush France by one quick 
dash on her capital, Paris, then turn more leisurely to 
the humilation of Russia, rob England of her colonies 
and world markets, and hold all together by her navy, 
with which she thought to supplant the English navy. 
Especially she looked to expansion to the southeast, 
over the Berlin-to-Bagdad Railroad, through the Bal¬ 
kans, through Constantinople, and on through Asia 
Minor, straight to the very heart of India. 

Results of the Three Years of Fighting. — But Ger¬ 
many fought for three years to make her way over 
Franco to Paris. She easily penetrated as far as the 
Marne River, very near to her goal, in the first month 
of the war, but was driven back, and held. In other 
parts of the world also she failed to accomplish her 
ends. Indeed, she had few gains to show after three 
years of fighting. The two sides seemed stalemated. 

THE UNITED STATES AS A NEUTRAL 

Neutrality and its Meaning. — For two and a half 
years, down to the spring of 1917, the United States 
remained true to the neutrality that President Wash- 



















































































428 


THE WORLD WAR 


ington in 1793 had recommended should be the position 
of the country in all foreign wars. As prescribed by 
her own rules of neutrality,’the country did not send 
its army and navy to help either side, sent out no 
military expeditions in aid of either, refused to allow 
its citizens to enlist here to fight for either side, and pre¬ 
vented the. warships of either side from coming in to take 
on either men or arms. The President and Congress 
abstained from espousing the cause of one or the other , 
of the warring nations, in any official document. 

Acts that Neutrality did not Forbid. — The neutral¬ 
ity laws of the United States might have forbidden 
many other acts that tended to assist the combating 
forces. In the first place, almost from the very be¬ 
ginning, the bankers of the United States loaned money 
by the hundreds of millions of dollars to England, 
France, and their allies, though the United States gov¬ 
ernment loaned nothing from its national treasury. 
Secondly, the United States allowed the European coun¬ 
tries to come here and buy food, clothing, coal, petro¬ 
leum, military equipment, munitions, and war material 
of every sort. All were welcomed on equal terms, and 
they all came, Germans and Englishmen alike, until the 
English navy conquered the sea and barred the way 
to the Germans. The latter power complained that it 
was unneutral for this country to sell munitions to one 
side and not to the other. The complaint was unjust, 
since the Americans held their markets open to all, and 
were ready to sell to all alike, whoever came to buy. If 
one warring power prevented the other from coming to 
buy, that was no fault of the Americans, who held 
themselves ready to fill German orders as fast as they 
came in. The German orders ceased to come simply 


THE WORLD WAR 


i 


429 


because it was evident to all that no goods shipped 
from America could ever get to Germany. 

The Submarine Controversy with Germany. — In her 
attempt to overcome the British advantage on the sea, 
Germany made effective use of an American invention, 
the submarine. On May 7, 1915, the world was shocked 
by the news that a German submarine had sunk the 
British liner, the Lusitania, and sent to watery graves 
over one thousand men, women, and children, including 
over one hundred Americans. Other sinkings, just as 
fearful, though not so costly in human life, took place 
in the following months. It seemed to some that Amer¬ 
ica must enter the fight against Germany to protect her 
citizens on the sea from such brutality. Ships of war 
in situations similar to that of the German ships, fight¬ 
ing the enemy far away at sea and prevented by a block¬ 
ade from taking their captures home, for example, the 
Alabama and her sister ships of the Confederate States 
of America, 1861-1865, had frequently sunk enemy ships 
of commerce. But down to 1915 ships in such circum¬ 
stances had always saved the lives of the people on 
board the intended victim before sinking her. It re¬ 
mained for the Germans to sink the ships, together with 
passengers and crew, without saving any. In their 
defense the Germans contended that their submarine 
was a very delicate ship, easily sunk by the slightest 
blow, and that therefore they must take no risks. If 
in mercy they allowed the captive commercial ship to 
remain afloat, the least shot from her might destroy 
the submarine. The latter, moreover, had no room to 
take captive passengers and crews on board. A long 
dispute between the two countries followed the destruc¬ 
tion of the Lusitania. It ended with the promise of 


430 


THE WORLD WAR 


Germany, first, to pay indemnity for the lives of the 
Americans lost on the ship, and, second, not to allow 
her submarines to fire on her victims without warning 
and chance to the passengers and crew to escape. The 
assurance, however, was of little value, for Germany 
proceeded to place the passengers and crew of the vic¬ 
tim commercial ships adrift on the high seas in open 
boats, considering this to be the promised safety. The 
inhumanity of the submarine aroused the entire world. 

Trade Disputes with England. — The disputes of neu¬ 
tral United States with Great Britain were different 
from those with Germany, for they were entirely com¬ 
mercial in character. England snuffed out no American 
lives on the sea. She enforced the law of contraband 
and of blockade on Germany, just as she had done 
against France a century earlier, and just as the United 
States had done against the Confederate States 1861— 
1865. Here the rights of belligerent and neutral came 
into conflict, as they always do in time of a war on 
the sea. Americans were roused, when England put 
cotton, sugar, rubber, and petroleum on the contra¬ 
band list, and captured them, when bound for Ger¬ 
many, whenever she was able. England, too, made a 
very far reaching application of the practice of con¬ 
traband and blockade, when she acted on the assump¬ 
tion that trade with Holland, and with Norway, Sweden, 
and Denmark was included under her prohibition of 
trade with Germany, although these were peaceful neu¬ 
tral countries. This was a terrible blow against the 
countries which Nature had located neighboring to 
Germany, but the action of England rested on the well- 
known fact that a part of the goods that reached these 
countries over the sea, were sent forward by land into 


THE WORLD WAR 


431 


Germany. Goods from neutral America, sent to Hol¬ 
land, or to the Baltic States farther north, were not, 
therefore, sure of getting through, if England suspected 
that from Holland or from any of the neutral countries, 
the goods would get into Germany. This was an annoy¬ 



ing interference with neutral trade, but many in Amer¬ 
ica took the position that the government at Washing¬ 
ton ought not to object to a practice, which she had 
herself used against England during the Civil War, when 
England sought to introduce goods into the Confeder¬ 
acy via the neutral ports in the West Indies. Disputes 
with England on this question ended when the United 
States entered the war. 
























432 


THE WORLD WAR 


THE UNITED STATES AS A BELLIGERENT 

Unrestricted Submarine Warfare. — Germany did 
not keep her pledge to cease her inhuman submarine 
practice. First, as has been pointed out, she claimed 
that she was saving passengers and crew, when she set 
them adrift on the sea in open boats. January, 1917, 
she formally announced that she would regard even that 



Woodrow Wilson 


promise as no longer binding, and would sink every 
commercial ship on sight within certain specified areas. 
This roused President Wilson. He sent the German am¬ 
bassador, von Bernstorff home, and broke off all re¬ 
lations with Germany. 

Other German Practices. — Her practices on the sea 

were not the whole of Germany’s offensive conduct. Her 
ambassador and other official representatives had tried 



THE WORLD WAR 


433 


to stir up strikes among the workmen in the factories of 
the United States, which were turning out munitions 
for the Allies. There had been suspicious fires in these 
factories, and in various ships that were ready to carry 
their products to Europe; these fires, and various ex¬ 
plosions in the factories seemed to' be the work of Ger¬ 
many and her agents. The Austrian minister, Dumba, 
and two subordinates of the German embassy were sent 
home for their part in the practices some months be¬ 
fore the dismissal of the German ambassador. Fuel 
was added to the flames by the Zimmerman correspon¬ 
dence, which revealed that the German Foreign Secre¬ 
tary, Zimmerman, had written to the German minister 
in Mexico, while the United States was still neutral, in¬ 
structing him to offer to Mexico the return of Texas, 
Arizona, and New Mexico, if that country would join 
in an attack on the United States. The evil inten¬ 
tions of Germany against the United States were now 
plain. Great was the outcry from the Atlantic to the 
Pacific. 

Declaration of War Recommended. — Germany went 
on with her unrestricted submarine campaign, as she had 
announced she would. President Wilson waited some 
weeks, but no change came in German policy. On 
April 2, 1917, he recommended to Congress war on Ger¬ 
many ir the following words: “With a profound sense 
of the solemn and even tragical character of the step I 
am taking and of the grave responsibilities which it 
involves, but in unhesitating obedience to what I deem 
my constitutional duty, I advise that the Congress de¬ 
clare the recent course of the Imperial German govern¬ 
ment to be in fact nothing less than war against the 
government and people of the United States; that it 


434 


THE WORLD WAR 


formally accept the status of belligerent which has 
thus been thrust upon it; and that it take immediate 
steps not only to put the country in a more thorough 
state of defense but also to exert all its power and 
employ all its resources to bring the government of the 
German empire to terms and end the war.” 

No Hostility to the German People. — The Presi¬ 
dent in the same speech made it clear that he had 
nothing but the friendliest of feelings for the German 
people and that it was only their government which he 
opposed. Said he: “ We have no quarrel with the Ger¬ 
man people. We have no feeling toward them but one 
of sympathy and friendship. ,It was not upon their 
impulse that their government acted in entering this 
war. It was not with their previous knowledge or 
approval. . . .” 

War Declared. — On April 6, Congress made the dec¬ 
laration called for by the President, and the United 
States entered the war on the side of the Allies. 

Many Discouragements. — The entry of the United 
States into the war was the cause of much encourage¬ 
ment to the Allies, at a time when the fortunes of war 
were going against them in various quarters. Early in 
the year 1917 the Bolshevists rose to power in Russia, 
made way with the Czar and all his government, con¬ 
cluded a humiliating peace with the Germans in the 
treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and withdrew their country 
from the war. Germany forced a peace also on Rou- 
mania. Inasmuch as Germany had no more enemies 
to busy her in the east, she transferred men to the west¬ 
ern front, where her power was correspondingly increased. 
Later in the year, in the south, the Italians who had 
made spectacular advances over the mountain tops, were 


THE WORLD WAR 435 

forced into a retreat through the Alps back to the Piave 
River, thus releasing more Germans and Austrians for 
service on the western front in France. In the midst of 
these discouragements there were three causes of encour¬ 
agement to the Allies. First and foremost the entry into 



General John J. Pershing 

the war, on their side, of the United States, the richest 
and most powerful country in the world; second, the 
success of the Allies in coming to an agreement that they 
should have one common commander, General Foch of 
France, for all their armies; and, third, the capture of Je¬ 
rusalem from the Turks at the very end of the year, three 
days before Christmas, 1917. This was the end of al- 












436 


THE WORLD WAR 


most six centuries of Mohammedan rule in this city 
of Jewish and Christian veneration. 

Germans Repulsed from Paris. — In the third year 
of the war, 1917-1918, the United States accomplished 
little beyond assembling her forces under General John 
J. Pershing and transporting them to France, prepar¬ 
atory to striking a blow. In the fourth year, 1918, 
the Germans by a series of great drives came up very 
close to Paris, but were turned back in July at Cha- 
teau-Thierry and Belleau Wood by American marines 
and regular infantrymen, in company with chosen 
French divisions. This was the beginning of the end 
for the Germans, and it was the first important en¬ 
gagement in which the Americans took part. 

St. Mihiel and the Argonne Forest. — In September 
of 1918 the Americans proved their mettle by driving 
the enemy! from another important part of the line, 
called the St. Mihiel salient. Sixteen thousand pris¬ 
oners and 443 guns were taken. Next, by terrible fight¬ 
ing, the Americans made their way through, the Ar¬ 
gonne Forest, and succeeded in pushing the extreme 
southern part of the line of battle, near the borderland 
of Switzerland, farther and farther back, until they 
reached Sedan. This put the Allies in possession of a 
very important railroad along the eastern border of 
France. 

Victories in the South. — The tide now turned in the 

Balkans, first by the surrender of Bulgaria; second, by 
the surrender of Turkey; and third by the surrender of 
Austria to Italy. In their final struggle here the Ital¬ 
ians made a wonderful advance, and captured over 
500,000 prisoners. 













































438 


THE WORLD WAR 


The Armistice. — The enemy was broken by all these 
disasters. To avoid the irresistible tide which she saw 
sweeping on toward her own borders, Germany raised 
the white flag, and sent her representatives within the 
Allied lines to ask for terms for an armistice, that is, 
for a cessation of fighting. This was granted and went 
into effect at eleven a.m. on November 11, 1918. By 
the terms of this preliminary agreement the Germans 



Photograph from Bain News Service 

Marshal Foch, Premier Clemenceau, Premier Lloyd-George, 
Premier Orlando and Foreign Minister Sonnino. 

surrendered vast quantities of stores and armament ; her 
soldiers were allowed to go home; her navy steamed 
into a British port in Scotland to surrender; and the 
Allies were allowed to occupy all the German territory 
west of the Rhine, including the cities of Cologne, 
Coblenz, and Mayence, which were at the head of 















THE WORLD WAR 


439 


bridges leading across the Rhine. On the eastern bank 
of the river a neutral zone was marked off, 6^ miles 
wide. 


THE SPIRIT OF SERVICE 

The Selective Draft. — A surprising spirit of unity 
and a wonderful devotion to unselfish public service in 
the United States were revealed, as soon as the war 
started, by the high favor in which the selective draft 
and the call to arms were regarded. The cheerful re¬ 
sponse of the men evoked great admiration both 
at home and abroad. Twenty-four million men 
between the. ages of 18 and 45 were enrolled for 
service, 2,800.000 were mobilized in camps, 2.000.000 
more were held in immediate reserve, and 2,000,000 sent 
abroad. The vast multitude was classified according 
to military and industrial needs in time of war. 
Through the physical examination of these men vital 
statistics were gathered that were of great value. When 
it was found that one-sixth of those examined were 
unfit for military service, the country was stimulated to 
new zeal for health conservation. 

The Care of the Soldiers. — Secondlv, the wonderful 
devotion of all to the public service was shown by the 
care lavished on the soldiers and sailors of the United 
States. The government sold a very cheap and valu¬ 
able form of life insurance to the men. By their hos- * 
pitals, canteen service, search for missing men, the 
writing of letters, and hundreds of other services, the 
Red Cross followed the men with as much of the thought¬ 
fulness of home as could be carried to the camps and 
battle-fronts. At Christmas time, 1917, 22,000,000 
Americans joined this society, assuring it of their sup- 


440 


THE WORLD WAR 



Photographs by The Central News, Ltd., London 

King George V of Great Britain greeting the captain of the 
army team at a baseball game played in London by teams from 
the American Army and Navy. Admiral Sims is standing by. 







THE WORLD WAR 


441 


port. There was the service of the Y.M.C.A., the Y. 
W.C.A., the Knights of Columbus, the Jewish Welfare 
Board, the American Library Association, and the War 
Camp Community Service, for the work of which the 
public subscribed $170,000,000 near the end of the war. 
Many of the country’s most eminent physicians and 
surgeons tended the sick and the wounded, and 
achieved wonderful results. Women volunteered for 
any service in which they could be of use, and uni¬ 
versally gave themselves to unflagging labor in the war 
camps in Europe, or in the Red Cross, preparing gar¬ 
ments and surgical dressings. 

Government Regulations. — Thirdly, the same zeal 
for the common cause inspired the people at home to 
undergo sacrifices that in ordinary times would not be 
tolerated. There was government regulation of prices, 
government dictation as to the sale of needed com¬ 
modities, such as sugar, flour, metal and steel prod¬ 
ucts, all cheerfully complied with. The government’s 
request that householders refrain from or use sparingly 
certain foods, that these might be shipped abroad, met 
with a ready response. An embargo was placed on all 
shipments abroad, and only authorized shipments to 
specified countries allowed. 

Liberty Loans. — Fourthly, the response of the people, 
when called upon to loan money to the government, was 
generous in the extreme. In four great Liberty Loans 
the people poured out into the lap of the government 
$17,500,000,000 at a low rate of interest; and in a fifth, 
or Victory Loan, after the armistice, 12,000,000 sub¬ 
scribers united in lending to the government $5,250,000,- 
000, to finish up the details of ending the war. 

Relief Work Abroad. — Fifthly, when the war ended, 


442 


THE WORLD WAR 


the people of the United States, who during the war 
had patriotically rationed themselves in the midst of 
abundance and had raised food products in greater quan¬ 
tities than ever before, were literally feeding the world. 
In the year 1918 they sent out of the country $2,000,- 
000,000 worth of food products as against $500,000,000 
in the year prior to the outbreak of the war. Much 
of this was of course paid for in the ordinary course 
of things, but much of it sprang from international 
charity, which amazed the world by its vast proportions. 

The United States Shipping Board. — The dependence 
of the foreign commerce of the United States upon the 
ships of other countries, which had given rise to the 
ship subsidy agitation since 1865, left the country in 
a bad plight when the war broke out in 1914, for the 
foreign ships were called home and there were few, 
almost no American ships to take their places. Ameri¬ 
can goods could not be shipped to Europe because 
there were so few ships to do the work. The ravages 
of the submarine added to the seriousness of the situ¬ 
ation. Improvement was slow down to 1917, but much 
faster after the United States entered the war and the 
government itself began to build ships. When the war 
was over the United States owned over thirteen hun¬ 
dred commercial vessels and was completing them at 
the rate of one per day in its government shipyards. It 
was these vessels, aided in part by foreign vessels, all 
convoyed by the warships of the United States and of 
Great Britain, that carried our 2,000,000 soldiers to 
Europe and back again. In time of peace these ships 
will do much toward winning back from foreign coun¬ 
tries that pre-eminence in the carrying trade on the 
ocean, which the United States lost in 1861-1865. 


THE WORLD WAR 


443 


Government Railroads and Telegraphs. — To secure 
increased efficiency during the war the railroads of the 
country were taken over by the government and oper¬ 
ated in accordance with a common policy. Friction, 
duplication, and injurious competition were done away 
with. The roads are now back again in private hands, 
but under very strict governmental supervision. Tel¬ 
egraphs, and telephone and express companies were also 
taken over by the government; the two former have 
been given back to their owners, while the last named 
are still in the hands of the government. 

THE TREATY OF PEACE 

The Peace Conference. — The envoys of the Allied 
Powers assembled in Paris in January, 1919, to draw 
up the terms of a permanent peace. President Wilson 
headed the delegation of five from the United States. 
Long negotiations followed, in which Germany was not 
allowed to participate ; but on June 28 the delegates of 
the latter power were allowed to enter the Congress 
and sign the treaty of peace. Separate treaties were 
made with Austria, Turkey, and Bulgaria. 

Settlement of the Immediate Problems of the War. — 
There were two problems before the congress. First, 
that of Germany. That power lost the two provinces 
of Alsace and Lorraine, which she had herself taken 
from France in 1870, while the colonies which she pos¬ 
sessed in Africa and in the islands of the South Pacific 
Ocean were taken away from her and awarded to vari¬ 
ous Allied Powers upon special conditions. On her 
eastern border, and at the expense of Germany, Aus¬ 
tria and Russia, the new state of Poland was created, 


444 


THE WORLD WAR 


to serve as a barrier against Germany in that direction, 
while on her south the new state of Czecho-Slovakia 
constituted another barrier on her very borders. In 
the Balkan peninsula the power of the Slavs was in¬ 
creased by the formation of the new states of Jugo¬ 
slavia. The dual monarchy of Austria-Hungary was 
broken up, Hungary made independent, and Austria 
reduced to a small state. Turkey was deprived of a 
large part of her territory. The German dream of ex¬ 
pansion to the southeast through the Balkan States, 
along the Berlin-to-Bagdad Railroad, thus vanished. 

The Republic of Germany. — The German people 
themselves became dissatisfied with their government, 
and rose up in rebellion. Emperor AVilliam fled to 
Holland for refuge, and still remains there. A German 
Republic has been set up after the federal plan of the 
United States, and along very advanced lines. The 
Allies refused to allow Austria to join Germany. 

The League of Nations. — The second problem of the 
Peace Congress centered about the desirability of cre¬ 
ating a League of Nations for the purpose of pre¬ 
venting war in the future. According to the plan laid 
down in the peace treaty, the member nations were to 
send delegates to form the consulting and legislative 
bodies of the league; and these two bodies, together 
with the officials of the League, were to guard the peace 
of the world, and so far as possible prevent wars be¬ 
tween nations. The various members of the Allies, 
which had charge of the German colonies, were to make 
reports to the League. 

Should the United States Enter the League? The Re¬ 
publicans. — Whether or not the United States should 
join the League, which at least forty other nations had 


THE WORLD WAR 


445 


joined, was the leading question in the presidential cam¬ 
paign of 1920. The Republicans, led by Senator War¬ 
ren G. Harding of Ohio as their candidate, were against 
the league, as it then stood. They believed that the 
army of the United States should not be allowed to 
leave the country for service abroad at the request of 
the League, as this would create out of the League a 
super-state, with sovereignty over the United States. 
Only the Congress of the United States should be al¬ 
lowed to give the word for such an expedition. The 
Republicans were afraid, too, that the League might 
order troops of European countries into South America 
to perform service there that would violate the Monroe 
Doctrine. They believed that the United States under 
the Monroe Doctrine had succeeded well in preserving 
South America from outside powers, and should be al¬ 
lowed to continue to do so, subject only to such under¬ 
standings and cooperation with the South American 
powers as seemed wise. 

The Democrats. — The Democrats, led by James M. 
Cox of Ohio, pointed out that the League could only 
request the various nations to send their troops abroad, 
and they believed that this left the way open for the 
Congress of the United States to refuse the request, if 
it so desired. They asserted that the sovereignty of 
the country was not in danger. They did not under¬ 
stand how troops sent by the League into South Amer¬ 
ica could violate the Monroe Doctrine, as the League 
was interested in performing in South America, and in 
all other countries of the world, the very same services 
as the United States herself had performed in South 
America, under the Monroe Doctrine. 

The two parties were equally anxious to preserve the 


446 


THE WORLD WAR 


peace of the world by international agreement, but 
disagreed as to the means. 

The Victory of the Republicans. — At the election 
on November 2, in which, under the nineteenth amend¬ 
ment, women voted in every state for the first time, 
Harding achieved an overwhelming victory. His pop¬ 
ular majority was about 7,000,000, the largest ever given 
any candidate, while in the electoral colleges the vote 
stood 404 to 127. 

The Disarmament Conference. — The most impor¬ 
tant event in the first year of the new administration 
was the coming together of the Disarmament Confer¬ 
ence in Washington. Supported by the public opinion 
of the entire world, delegates from the leading countries 
of the world debated and agreed upon measures to 
keep the peace. Great Britain, France, Italy, Japan, 
and the United States consented to reduce the size of 
their navies, and to refrain for ten years from building 
additional ships. By the terms of the arrangement, 
the navies of Great Britain and the United States, 
the largest in the world, were to be of the same size, 
that of Japan three-fifths as large, and those of 
France and Italy still smaller. Never before had great 
nations formally consented to reduce their armed forces 
in a systematic fashion. By another treaty the nations 
of the Pacific bound themselves not to go to war, but 
to consult with one another when points of difference 
arose. Rules were made to control the use of sub¬ 
marines and poisonous gases in warfare. The conduct 
of the nations toward China was elaborately regulated, 
with a view to preserving that country’s independence. 

President Harding and Secretary of State Hughes, 
received great praise for their call and management of 


THE WORLD WAR 447 

the conference, and for the wide-reaching results that 
were achieved. 


Suggestive Questions 

1. What murder brought on the World War? What choice 
did Italy make? Why did Germany inflict sufferings on 
Belgium? What side did England take, and why? With 
what hopes did England enter the war? 

2. What is neutrality? What president before Wilson had 
adopted neutrality as the policy of the United States during 
a European war. What acts was the United States forbidden 
to do by her neutrality? What was the submarine contro¬ 
versy with Germany? What was the Lusitania incident? 
What disputes did the United States have with England 
while the former was neutral? 

3. What German practices forced the United States into 
the war? What was the attitude of the United States 
toward the German people? What position was held by 
General Foch? Who captured Jerusalem in Palestine? What 
was the St. Mihiel salient? The Argonne Forest? To what 
power was Austria forced to surrender? What was the 
armistice ? 

4. What was the selective draft? How did the United 
States care for the soldiers? What were the various welfare 
boards? Describe the Liberty Loans? What was the United 
States Shipping Board? 

5. What was the Peace Conference in Paris? Name the 
leading new states formed in Europe by the peace treaty. 
What changes did the German people themselves make in 
their own government? What is meant by the League of 
Nations? What are the arguments for and against the United 
States entering such a league? Describe the presidential con¬ 
test in 1920. 


Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the United States should have entered 
the League of Nations as framed by the Peace Conference. 


448 


THE WORLD WAR 


Literary Digest, March 8, 1919; New York Times Current 
History, IX, part 2, 395. 

2. Resolved, That the United States should have entered 
the war against Germany at the outset in 1914. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. Wilson’s Reception in Europe. New York Times Cur¬ 
rent History, IX, part 2, 198. 

2. The Surrender of the German Fleet. New York Times 
Current History, IX, part 1, 382. 

Topics for Further Study 

1. The Submarine. New York Times Current History, 
IX, part 1, 255; IX, part 1, 487; and II, 409. 

Important Dates 

1914. World War begins. 

1917. United States enters the war. 

1918. End of World War. 

Books to Remember 

1. John H. Latane, From Isolation to Leadership . 

2. Charles Seymour, Diplomatic Background of the War. 

3. James M. Beck, The Evidence in the Case. 


CHAPTER XXV 


IMMIGRATION AND THE NEW 
CITIZENSHIP 

IMMIGRATION 

Immigration at every Stage of American History. 

— Americans are all immigrants or the descendants of 
immigrants. Whether in the colonizing period of the 
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, during the Revo¬ 
lutionary War, the Civil War, and the World War, or 
in the periods of growth and expansion, in every period 
and crisis there have been immigrant Americans who 
have been on these shores, some a longer, and some a 
shorter time. The new citizens have always stood 
shoulder to shoulder with the old citizens, and all have 
made their contribution to the common cause. 

In the Revolutionary War. — The newcomers were in 
the front ranks of those who fought for American inde¬ 
pendence. The English historian, Lecky, says that “ ad¬ 
venturous immigrants, who had lately poured in by 
thousands from Ireland and Scotland . . . ultimately 
bore the chief part in the war of independence.” John 
Paul Jones, and other lately arrived immigrants, were 
as thorough-going Americans, as if they had sprung 
from the soil of the country. 

The New Tide in 1848. — The Revolutionary War 
and the resulting unsettled conditions checked the flow 
of Europeans to America for half a century. In 1820 

449 


450 IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 


only 8,000 immigrants arrived on the shores of the 
United States, but ten times as many in 1840, and 
almost a hundred times as many in 1850. A great 
increase set in with the year 1848, which was made up, 
first, of Irish, driven from home by the famine 
which was stalking through their land as the result 
of the failure of the Irish potato crop in the year 
1846; secondly, of Germans, fleeing the stern re¬ 
pression of political revolution in Germany; and, thirdly, 
to a slight extent, of Englishmen. The Irish took 
up their residence mainly in the cities on the seaboard, 
or went to work on the construction of the railroads, 
which was then going on in every part of the country. 
The Germans settled farther inland, going especially to 
the cities and farms of Wisconsin and Missouri. Most 
of these newcomers of the middle of the nineteenth cen¬ 
tury were hard-working artisans, and as haters of slav¬ 
ery, they seldom settled in the slave states. There 
were frequent riots against the recently arrived inhab¬ 
itants, due to the disinclination of those who had been 
in this country for a considerable period and had en¬ 
joyed its freedom and opportunity, to allow others to 
come in and enjoy the same privileges. 

During the Civil War.— Lincoln depended upon im¬ 
migrants to help save the Union during the Civil War. 
Patriotic anti-slavery Germans saved Missouri to the 
Union in the critical months of the first year of that 
conflict. Whole regiments in the armies of the North 
could not speak the English language. Of the 31,000,- 
000 in the United States in 1860, 4,000,000 or thirteen 
per cent, were foreign-born. 

Efforts to Attract Immigration during the Civil War. 
— Great efforts were naturally made during the Civil 


IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 451 

War to attract European labor. Manufacturers sent 
their agents abroad to enlist the services of the pro¬ 
spective immigrants for their factories. Congress, too, 
did its part. A new law set up the Bureau of Immi¬ 
gration in New York, which was presided over by a 
Commissioner of Immigration, to protect the ignorant 
Europeans from boarding house and transportation 
swindlers, and to gather statistics. The Homestead Law 
was very generous to the citizens of other countries, 
who would come to these shores to live, allowing them 
to take up their homestead farms in the West on the 
same terms as citizens of the United States. 

The Danes, Swedes, and Norwegians. — To the Irish 
and the Germans, who were the chief nationalities at¬ 
tracted to the country before 1865, there were added 
gradually afteri 1865 large numbers from Denmark, 
Norway, and Sweden. These northern Europeans went 
mainly to the farming lands of Wisconsin, Minnesota, 
Iowa, Nebraska, and the two Dakotas. They were de¬ 
voted to church life, to public schools and colleges, and 
to the political life of their new homes. 

A New Tide. Eastern and Southern .Europeans. — 
In the decade between 1880 and 1890 the numbers of 
immigrants from Ireland, Germany, and England began 
to decline, and those from Austria, Hungary, Russia, 
Italy, and the Balkan States, began to increase, while 
the proportion from the Scandinavian 'countries re¬ 
mained the same. When the first national law restrict¬ 
ing immigration went into effect in 1882, the number 
of immigrants reached its highest point to that time, 
800,000. It remained near this mark for some years, 
when a financial panic in the early nineties and the 
ensuing hard times took it doyrn to 230,000 in 1898. 


MILLIONS OF INHABITANTS 


452 IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 



The 1,000,000 mark was reached in five different years 
from 1905-1913. At the opening of the twentieth cen- 


MILLIONS OF INHABITANTS 

















































































IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 453 


tury persecuted Jews were coming from Russia by the 
tens of thousands, chiefly to engage in the ready-made 
garment trade in the large cities. Hungarians, Austrians, 
Poles, and Slavs were attracted by the work in the 
iron and coal industries in the vicinity of Cleveland 
and Pittsburgh. 

During the World War. — By the time the World 
War opened there were 13,000,000 foreign-born in the 
country, which, including the 18,000,000 born in the 
country, one or both parents of whom were born abroad, 
brings up to 31,000,000 the number of those in the 
United States whose parentage was foreign. One-third 
of the people of the country were born in foreign lands 
or had foreign parents. Forty per cent of the pop¬ 
ulation of New York was foreign-born. Out of this 
mass, fused with native Americans in the “ melting pot,” 
America raised its armies to help free the world from 
German imperialism. 

The Services of Immigrants. — The services of the 
great mass of immigrant population in the industrial 
world are incalculable. Individuals of foreign birth 
could be mentioned, who have been the very captains of 
American industry, while in particular industries the 
greater part of the labor is performed by immigrants. 
In the clothing industry, foreigners perform nineteen- 
twentieths of the work, in the bituminous coal mining 
industry seven-tenths of the work, etc. 

The Exclusion of the Chinese. — From the middle of 
the nineteenth century there had been Chinese on the 
Pacific coast, attracted by labor in the mines and on 
the railroads, and by opportunities for domestic service. 
The Asiatics worked for low wages, lived in squalid 
quarters on a few cents a day, and in general competed 


454 IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 


with the whites on terms which to the latter were 
intolerable. Their presence, too, threatened another 
race problem like that of the negroes and the Indians. 
First the labor unions, and then the general public on 
the Pacific coast, clamored for their exclusion; and the 
demand increased to such proportions that Congress 
soon after 1880 excluded Chinese immigrants from the 

country for ten years. Those 
who were already on these 
shores could remain, but no 
more could come in. The ex¬ 
clusion was renewed from 
time to time, and is now in 
force. 

General Restriction of Im¬ 
migration. — At about the 
same time the national gov¬ 
ernment put its first restric¬ 
tions on immigration from 
Europe, without absolutely 
prohibiting it. The labor 
unions, which always arc 
in favor of keeping down the supply of new labor, 
favored the restriction. Lunatics and convicts were 
excluded, all liable to become a public charge, and 
all contract laborers, that is, all coming under contract 
to perform certain labor. 

The Educational Test. — Perhaps the most important 
phase of the immigration problem of the present time 
is the question of whom to exclude, and whom to 
admit. Since 1882 exclusion has been extended from 
time to time to those afflicted with loathsome dis¬ 
eases, to anarchists, and finally, in 1917, over the 



Per Cent Distribution of 
Foreign-Born Population, 

1910 

Total Foreign-Born, 
13,515,886. 


IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 455 

President’s veto, to illiterates. Under a special and 
temporary law, which has just been enacted to prevent 
a flood of immigration sweeping over the country, there 
can now enter the United States in a single year from 
any particular foreign country only three per cent of the 
citizens of that country who were in the United States 
in 1910. 

The New Citizenship. — A farm, a place in an indus¬ 
trial plant, and free education for the children, are 
among the benefits conferred upon the newcomers; but 
these are not all. The European, recently arrived in 
America, has the protection of the laws; he can hold 
property, use the courts to protect himself against crime 
and oppression, and in some states he can vote, even be¬ 
fore he is made a citizen. Most important of all, through 
easy and liberal processes of naturalization, he can 
acquire citizenship in his adopted home. The simple 
declaration, “ I am an American citizen,” will bring 
universal protection and redress of grievances. To se¬ 
cure the new citizenship, the applicant must first secure 
preliminary naturalization papers; and after five years’ 
residence he may apply for his final papers. When 
making this final application, the applicant must be 
accompanied and vouched for, in the presence of the 
judge of the United States court, or of certain state 
courts, by a citizen of the United States, who swears 
to the integrity and good character of the applicant. 
The applicant must be “ white,” or a person of “ Afri¬ 
can descent”; other races, and all alien enemies, poly¬ 
gamists, and anarchists, are rejected* The applicant 
must also prove to the judge that he has u behaved as 
a person of good moral character,” that he is “ attached 
to the principles of the Constitution and well disposed 


456 IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 


to the good order and happiness of the same,” and that 
he understands the English language. There can be 
no question that the newcomer ought to know the lan¬ 
guage of his adopted country, when he appeals to the 
majesty of the law and requests to be admitted to 
citizenship. 

Exceptions.— The unnaturalized were subject to the 
selective draft for military service during the World 
War, when citizens and non-citizens alike were called 
into the army, but after their return to America from 
the battlefields of France thousands of the unnatural¬ 
ized soldiers were rewarded with citizenship papers, re¬ 
gardless of whether or not they had met all the formal 
requirements. 

Americanism. — It is the duty of all who have come 
to America and are enjoying its privileges, to take out 
naturalization papers and become citizens. This is 
their country, in which they do their work and bring 
up their families, and in which they expect to live and 
die. It is theirs for the opportunties it offers and the 
protection it affords, and it is theirs too in the obliga¬ 
tion it places upon them to bear a share of its burdens. 
For old and new citizens to work together for the coun¬ 
try’s good, and to conserve the best that native and 
foreign born alike contribute to the national character, 
this is the true Americanism. 

Suggestive Questions 

1. What can you say of immigrants during the Revolu¬ 
tionary War? During the Civil War? During the World 
War? What change in immigration came in 1848? Did 
the Homestead Law benefit immigrants, who were not citi¬ 
zens? Explain the exclusion of the Chinese. What class de¬ 
sires further restriction of immigration at present? What is 


IMMIGRATION AND NEW CITIZENSHIP 457 


the educational test? Is it now law? What can you say of 
the services of immigrants to the United States? What is 
naturalization? What exceptions to the usual terms of nat¬ 
uralization were made during and after the World War? 
What is Americanism? 

Topics for Debate 

1. Resolved, That the educational test for the admission 
of immigrants into the United States should be removed. 

Topics for Compositions 

1. The United States, the Home of Immigrants. Steiner, 
Trail of the Immigrant; A. E. S. Beard, Our Foreign-Born 
Citizens (very valuable). 

2. Immigration since 1900. Fairchild, Immigration; La- 
tane, World Power, 285, 303; Jenks and Lauck, Immigration 
Problem. 

Important Dates 

1848. Heavy Irish and German Immigration. 

1882. Chinese Exclusion. 

1917. Educational Test for Immigrants. 

1921. General Restriction of Immigration to Three Per 
Cent. 










































I. 




• . 












. • J 




















' 

























BOOK TITLES TO REMEMBER 


(Full titles of these books may be obtained in 
or in any large bookstore.) 

Adams, H., United States 
Beck, Evidence in the Case 
Channing, United States 
Cook, Voyages of Discovery 
Du Bois, Soul of a Black Man 
Fiske, American Revolution 

-, Beginnings of New England 

-, Critical Period 

-, Discovery of America 

——, Mississippi Valley 

-, Old Virginia and her Neighbors 

Ford, Washington 

Foster, Century of American Diplomacy 

-, Practice of Diplomacy 

Franklin, Autobiography 
Hart, American Nation 
Hulbert, Historic Highways 
Latane, From Isolation to Leadership 
Lecky, American Revolution 
Lodge, Washington 

-, Webster 

McMaster, United States 
Nicolay and Hay, Lincoln 
Parkman, Conspiracy of Pontiac 

-, Half Century of Conflict 

-, La Salle and the Great West 

-, Montcalm and Wolfe 

-, Pioneers of France in the New World 

Rhodes, United States 
Roosevelt, Winning of the West 

459 


any city library 


% 












460 


BOOK TITLES TO REMEMBER 


Royce, California 

Schurz, Henry Clay 

Seymour, Diplomatic Background 

Shepard, Martin Van Buren 

Stanwood, Presidency 

Sumner, Jackson 

Tarbell, Lincoln 

Thompson-Seton, Life Histories of Northern Animals 

Trevelyan, American Revolution 

Tyler, American Revolution 

Vancouver, Voyages of Discovery 

Villard, John Brown 

Washington, Up From Slavery 

Wilson, Wild Animals of North America 


LIST OF BOOKS REFERRED TO IN THE 
QUESTIONS, TOPICS FOR DEBATE, ETC. 


(Full titles of these books may be obtained in any large library, 
or in any large bookstore). 

Adams, H., United States 
Avery, United States 

Bailey, Sketch of the Evolution of our Native Fruits 
Barnes, Story of the American Navy 
Bassett, Federalist System 
Beard, Our Foreign Born Citizens. 

Bourne, Essays 
Bradford, Lee the American 
Bruce, Robert E. Lee 

-, Expansion 

-, Daniel Boone 

Coffin, Boys of Seventy-Six 

-, Province of Quebec and the Early American Revolu¬ 
tion 

Dale, Ashley Cooper Explorations 
Dana, Makers of America 

Denys, Description and Natural History of the Coasts of 
North America 
Dyer, Thomas H. Edison 

Earle, Customs and Fashions in Old New England 

Elson, Side-lights on American History 

Fairchild, Immigration 

Farrand, Framing the Constitution 

Fisher, Men , Women and Manners in Colonial Times 

Fiske, Critical Period 

Fite, Presidential Campaign of 1860 

-, Social and Industrial Conditions 

Font, Diary 


461 






462 REFERENCES IN QUESTIONS AND TOPICS 


Fow, True Story of the American Flag 

Friedemvald, Declaration of Independence 

Halsey, Epochs in American History 

Harding, Oratio7is Illustrating American Political History 

Hart, • Camps and Campfires of the Revolution 

•-, Colonial Children 

-, Contemporaries 

-, How Our Grandfathers Lived 

-, John Paul Jones 

-, Romance of the Civil War 

-, Slavery and Abolition 

-, Source Book 

Hornaday, Extermination of American Bison 

Hough, Story of the Cowboy 

Hulbert, Historic Highways 

lies, Inventors at Work 

Jackson, Century of Dishonor 

Jenks and Lauck, Immigration Problem 

Latane, United States as a World Power 

Laut, Conquest of the Great Northwest 

-, Pathfinders 

Leupp, The Indian 

Lodge, Daniel Webster 

Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero Tales 

Love, Fast and Thanksgiving Days of New England 

McKellar, Report on Quebec 

McMasters, United States 

McMurray, Pioneers on Land and Sea 

Merriam, Primary Elections 

Mills, In Beaver World 

Morse, Benjamin Franklin 

Mowry, Inventions and Inventors 

Munro, Government of the United States 

Neihardt, The Splendid Wayfaring 

New York Times, Current History 

Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln 

Old South Leaflets 

Page, Robert E. Lee 

Phillips, Beginnings of Washington 

Rhodes, United States 









REFERENCES IN QUESTIONS AND TOPICS 463 


Rolt-Wheeler, Thomas A. Edison 
Roosevelt, Winning of the West 

-, The Wilderness Hunter 

-, Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail 

-, Hunting Trips of a Ranchman 

-, Outdoor Pastimes of an American Hunter 

Roosevelt and Grinnell, Hunting in Many Lands 
Roosevelt and Others, Stories of the Republic 
Seitz, Paid Jones 
Siebert, Underground Railroad 
Sparks, Expansion 

-, Men Who Made the Nation 

Stan wood, Presidency 
Steiner, Trail of the Immigrant 

Thompson-Seton, Life Histories of Northern Animals 
Thwaites, Daniel Boone 

-, How George Rogers Clark Won the Northwest 

-, Jesuit Relations 

Tyler, American Revolution 

Wilson, Wild Animals of North America 





































' 



























TOPICAL OUTLINE 


I. Early Explorations. 

1. Before Columbus. 

Claudius Ptolemy. His Map. 
Rejected by Mediaeval Scholars. 
Additions by, 

Northmen. 

Marco Polo. 

Prince Henry the Navigator. 
New routes to Spice Islands. 
Vasco da Gama. 1498. 

2. Columbus. 

His Aim. 

Sea Horrors. 

Four Voyages, 1492-1502. 

Asia reached. His belief. 

Name of America. 

Vespucius. 

Waldseemuller. 

3. Other Spanish voyages. 

Demarcation Line. 

Ponce de Leon. Florida. 1513. 
Balboa. Pacific. 1513. 

Cortez. Mexico. 1519. 

Peru. 1533. 

Interior of America. 

Hunch-backed cows. 

Zuni Indians. 

De Soto. Mississippi River. 
Coronado. 

Colorado River. 

Great Plains. 

St. Augustine. 1565. 

Santa Fe. 1605? 

Magellan. 1519. 


465 


466 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


4. Claims of Other Nations to America. 
England. 

Cabot. Labrador, 1497-8. 

France. 

Fishermen off Newfoundland. 1504. 
Verrazano. Hudson River. 1524. 
Cartier. St. Lawrence. 1535. 
Portugal. 

Cabral. Brazil. 1500. 

Cortereal. Newfoundland. 1500. 

II. First Settlements. 

1. Preliminary English Voyages. 

Fear of Spain. 

Northeast Passage. 

Northwest Passage. 

The Start for America. 

Frobisher. Northwest Passage. 

Davis. Northwest Passage. 

Gilbert. Newfoundland. 

Raleigh. Carolina. 

Spanish Armada. 1588. 

2. Virginia. 

London Company. 

Jamestown. 1607. 

Captain John Smith. 

Explorations. 

Pacific Ocean near. 

Northwest Passage. 

Slavery. 1619. 

House of Burgesses. 1619. 

Jealousy of Spain. 

3. New England. French and Dutch. 

French 

Champlain 

On New England Coast 
Quebec. 1608. 

Lake Champlain. 

Lake Ontario. 

Lake Huron. 

Lake Oneida. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


467 


Dutch. 

Henry Hudson. 1609. 

Cape Cod. 

Hudson River. 

Manhattan Island. 1614. 

Block. 1614. 

Nahant. 

Long Island Sound. 

May. Delaware Bay. 1614. 
New Netherland. Progress. 
Tasman. 

New Holland. 

4. New England. English. 

Voyages of Exploration. 

Gosnold. 

Pring. 

Weymouth. 

Smith. 1614. 

His Map. 

Places settled. 

Plymouth. Pilgrims. 1620. 
Reasons for Coming. 

Separatists. 

Hardships. 

Boston, etc. Puritans. 1630. 

Reasons for Coming. 
Providence. Rhode Island. 1636. 
Hartford. Connecticut. 1636. 

New Haven. 1638. 

New Hampshire. 

Maine. 1639. 

Government. 

Suffrage. 

Town Meeting. 

New England Confederation. 
Education. 

Public Schools. 

Colleges. 

Harvard. 1636. 

Yale. 1701. 


468 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


Indian Wars. 

Pequot War. 

King Phillip’s War. 

Losses. 

5. Other English Voyages. 

The West Indies. 1623. 

Northwest Passage. 

“ Farthest North.” Baffin. 

III. Further Settlements. English and French Rivalry Outside 
New England. 

1. Spread of the English along the Coast. 

Maryland. 1634. 

Roman Catholics. 

New Netherland conquered. 1664. 

New Jersey. 

Quakers. 

Carolinas. 

Charleston. 1670. 

Pennsylvania. 

Philadelphia. 1683. 

Rapid Growth. 

Quakers. 

Beliefs. 

Persecutions. 

Delaware. 

Dominion of New England. 

Object. 

Reasons for Failure. 

Georgia. 

2. French in the Interior. 

On the Great Lakes. 

Champlain. 

Lakes Ontario and Huron. 

Lake Michigan. 1634. 

Lake Superior. After 1640. 

Lake Erie. About 1670. 

Jesuit Relations. 

Seizure of Lake Superior Country. 

Nature of the Country. 

Joliet and Marquette on the Mississippi. 1673 0 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


469 


Nature of the Country. 

Joliet’s Description. 

La Salle on the Mississippi. 1682. 

Texas Settlement. 

Failure. 

3. English on Hudson Bay. 

Fur Trade. 

IV. American Plants and Animals. 

1. Native Plants. 

Indian Corn. 

Methods of Cultivation. 

Tobacco. 

Prosperity of Virginia. 

Native Habits. 

Sugar. 

New European demand in 17th Century. 
To Sweeten New Drinks. 

Chocolate and cocoa. 

Coffee and tea. 

The “ Sugar Islands.” 

Cotton. 

Three Varieties at Present. 

Later Political influence. 

Rice, Potatoes, Melons, Tapioca, etc. 

2. Imported Plants. 

Wheat, Oats, etc. 

Garden Vegetables. 

3. Native Fruits. 

Grapes Universal. 

19th Century Developments. 

Concords, etc. 

Apples. 

Baldwins, McIntosh Reds, etc. 

Berries. 

Strawberries, etc. 

Plums and Cherries. 

Tomatoes. 

Bananas. 

4. Imported Fruits. 

Oranges and Lemons. 

Peaches and Pears. 


470 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


5. Forest Trees. 

Trees Familiar to Europeans. 

New Trees Found. 

Mahogany, etc. 

Imported Trees. 

Forest Products. 

Quinine, Arrowroot, Vanilla, Cayenne Pepper, 
Chocolate and Cocoa, Indigo, India Rubber, 
Brazil Wood. 

6. Big Game Animals. 

Buffaloes. 

Habits. 

Moose. 

Elk. 

White-tailed Deer. 

7. Fur-bearing Animals. 

Beavers. 

Habits. 

Muskrats. 

Mink. 

Marten. 

Lynx. 

Land Otter. 

Sea Otter. 

Alaska Fur Seal. 

8. Domestic Animals. 

Native. 

Llama and Alpaca. 

Imported. 

Horses. 

Cattle. 

Swine. 

Sheep, etc. 

9. Birds and Fish. 

Birds Familiar to Europeans. 

Turkeys Native. 

Fish Plentiful. 

V. English and French Wars. 

1. Preliminary Struggles. 

Conflict Inevitable. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


471 


King William’s War. 1689-1697. 

No Changes. 

Queen Anne’s War. 1702-1713. 

Acadia and Newfoundland to England. 

French Settle Louisiana. 

New Orleans. 1718. 

Communications and Forts between Canada and 
Louisiana. 

The Portages. 

King George’s War. 1744-1748. 

No Changes. 

2. The Seven Years’ War. 1756-1763. 

Mutual Jealousy over Ohio Valley. 

New French Forts between the Ohio and Lake Erie. 
War begun at Fort Duquesne. 

George Washington. 

Albany Plan of Union. 

Braddock’s Defeat. 

Washington. 

Outlying Forts Fall to English. 

Louisburg. 

Duquesne. 

Frontenac. 

Niagara. 

Lake Champlain. 

Geographical Importance. 

Ticonderoga and Crown Point Fall to England. 
Quebec. 

Geographical Importance. 

Falls to England. 

French Blunders. 

Treaty of -Peace at Paris. 

French Empire to England. 

Life in the Colonies in 1763. 

1. Population and Immigration. 

England’s Superiority. 

In Numbers. 

In Position. 

Immigrants Welcomed. 

What is an American? 


472 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


Racial Mixture. 

Immigration in 18th Century. 

Heavy. 

Spread of Population. 

Southwest from Philadelphia. 
Northwest from Charleston. 

Efforts to Attract Population. 
Proclamation of 1763. 

Check to Spread of Population. 
Defied. 

Tennessee. 

Kentucky. 

The Wilderness Road. 

Buffalo Roads. 

Lexington, 1775. 

2. Colonial Occupations. 

Agriculture Universal. 

The New England Town. 

The Southern Plantation. 

Negro Slavey. 

The Middle Colonies. Bread Colonies. 
Indian Trade. 

Shipbuilding. 

Three Cornered Trade. 

Navigation Laws. 

Shipbuilding. 

Manufacturing. 

Repressed by England. 

3. Education and Government. 

The Colleges. 

Kinds of Colonies. 

Royal. Virginia. 

Proprietary. Maryland. 

Corporate. Massachusetts. 

Scheme of Colonial Government. 
Interference by England. 

Governor’s Veto. 

Royal Veto. 

Court Appeals. 

English Laws for Colonies. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


473 


Local Government. 

Town meeting of New England. 
Plantation System. 

VII. Preliminary Quarrels with the Mother Country. 

1. New’ Revenue Laws. 

Need of New Laws for Colonies. 

Existing Writs of Assistance Enforced. 
The Sugar Act. 

Stamp Tax. 1765. 

Stamp Act Congress. 

Townshend Acts. 

Two Leaders. 

King George III. 

For Strict Control of America. 

William Pitt. 

Friend of America. 

Tories and Whigs. 

Resentment in America. 

Boston Massacre. 1770. 

Boston Tea Party. 1773. 

Five Intolerable Acts. 

Boston Port Bill. 

Massachusetts Government Act. 
Administration of Justice Act. 

Quartering Act. 

Quebec Act. 

2. First Continental Congress. 

Various Acts. 

Two Leaders. 

Samuel Adams. 

Patrick Henry. 

VIII. War of Independence. 

1. First Blows of War. 

Concord and Lexington. 1775. 

Ticonderoga and Crown Point. 

Bunker Hill. 

2. Declaration of Independence. 

Second Continental Congress. 

Leaders. 

Acts of War. 


474 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


Washington Commander-in-Chief. 
Expedition agamst Canada. 

Failure at Quebec. 

Leaders. 

Georgei III Implacable 
Petitions Rejected. 

Proclamation of Rebellion. 

Hessians. 

Declaration of Independence. 1776. 
Justification. 

Articles of Confederation. 

Two Leaders. 

Benjamin Franklin. 

Thomas Jefferson. 

3. War in the Middle States. 

New York Held. 

Battle of Long Island. 

White Plains. 

Retreat across New Jersey. - 
Trenton. 

Princeton. 

4. Philadelphia and Saratoga Campaigns. 

Philadelphia Falls to English. 

Burgoyne Invades New York. 

Crown Point and Ticonderoga. 

Wrong Route to Hudson. 

Saratoga Surrender. 

Supporting Columns Fail. 

French Alliance. 

Franklin. 

England Offers Compromise. 

Refused. 

Valley Forge. 

British leave Philadelphia for New York. 
Benedict Arnold at West Point. 

Major Andre. 

5. War in the Southern States. 

Successes and Failures. 

Savannah. 

Charleston. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


475 


Camden. 

King’s Mountain. 

Cowpens. 

Green’s Strategy. 

Yorktown. 1781. 

6. Naval War. 

French Navy wins at Yorktown. 

English Navy wins in West Indies. 
American Navy. 

John Paul Jones. 

7. Treaty of Peace, 1783. 

Terms. 

The Northwest Territory. 

George Rogers Clark. 

8. Loyalists. 

IX. Adopting the Frame of Government. 

1. Articles of Confederation. 

Weaknesses of the Articles. 

Seven Enumerated. 

Spirit of Unrest. 

Shays’s Rebellion. 

Washington’s Opinion. 

Ordinance of 1787. 

New States. 

Slavery. 

Religious Liberty. 

Education. 

2. Constitution of 1787. 

Constitutional Convention. 1787. 

Leaders. 

Compromises. 

Five Enumerated. 

Articles of Confederation vs. Constitution. 
A Contrast. 

Four Points Enumerated. 

Powers of Congress. 

Six Enumerated. 

Powers of the States. 

Adoption of the Constitution. 

Votes in Large and Small States. 


476 TOPICAL OUTLINE 

X. Immediate Success of the Constitution. 

1. Starting the New Government. 

George Washington. First President. 
Financial Measures. 

First Tariff Law. 

Excise Law. 

Whiskey Rebellion. 

Funding the National Debt. 

Assumption of State Debts. 

National Bank. 

Alexander Hamilton. 

Secretary of the Treasury. 

Ten Amendments to the Constitution. 
First Political Parties. 

Federalists and Anti-Federalists. 
Federalists and Democratic-Republicans. 
Washington’s Farewell Address. 

Three Unwise Laws under Adams. 
Naturalization Act. 

Alien Act. 

Sedition Act. 

Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions. 
Thomas Jefferson. President. 

Disputed Election. 1S00. 

Changes under Jefferson. 

Taxes. 

Navy, etc. 

XI. Foreign Affairs. 1789-1815. 

1. Under Washington and Adams. 

War in Europe. 

Food Imports Necessary there. 

Neutrality of America. 

The Jay Treaty. 

French retaliation. 

2. Under Jefferson. 

Grievances of United States. 

Impressment. 

Paper Blockade. 

Contraband. 

Jefferson’s policy. 

Embargo Act. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


477 


3. Under Madison. 

War with England. 

On the Water. 

Constitution and Guerriere. 

Perry on Lake Erie. 

MacDonough on Lake Champlain. 
British Control of the Sea. 

On Land. 

Niagara Falls. 

Detroit. 

Along Lake Champlain. 

Castine and Washington. 

New Orleans. 

Effect of the Battle. 

Treaty of Peace. Ghent. 

Disarmament on the Great Lakes. 
XII. Growth of the West. 

1. New Settlements. 

Kentucky and Tennessee. 

Marietta in Ohio. 

Expeditions against the Indians, 

In the Northwest. 

Fallen Timbers. Wayne. 
Tippecanoe. Harrison. 

In the Southwest. 

Jackson. 

2. Communication and Transportation. 

Mohawk Trail. 

Cumberland Road. 

Erie Canal. 

Railroads. 

James Watt. 

John Stevens 
Peter Cooper. 

Baltimore and Ohio. 

Other Roads. 

Steamboats. 

On Rivers. The Clermont. 

On the Ocean. 

The Telegraph. S. F. B. Morse. 

The Atlantic Cable. 


478 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


3. Opening up the Land. 

Gifts of Public Lands. 

Selling the Lands. 

Surveying the Lands. 

Clearing the Forests. 

Making a Farm on the Prairies. 

XIII. Four Centuries of Explorations along the Pacific Coast. 

1. Early voyages. 

Spaniards, 
de Ulloa. 

Cabrillo. 

Viscaino. 

Drake. Nova Albion. 

Kino. 

Bering. Alaska. 

2. Rivalry over the Fur Trade. 

New Spanish voyages after 1769. 

San Francisco, 1776. 

Captain Cook. 

Three Voyages after 1768. 

Many Followers. 

Captain Gray. Columbia River. 

Captain Vancouver. 

Hearn and McKenzie. 

3. Expansion of the United States overland to the Pacific. 

Purchase of Louisiana. 

Benefits. 

Constitutionality. 

Expedition of Lewis and Clark. 

Zebulon Pike. 

Interior of California. 

Geographical Fakers. 

XIV. Domestic Politics. 1815-1845. 

1. The Tariff Question. 

Infant Industries. 

Cotton and Woolen Factories. 

The Cotton Gin. 

Iron Mills. 

2. Administrations of James Monroe and John Quincy 

Adams. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


479 


James Monroe. 

John Quincy Adams. 

Tariff of Abominations. 

3. Administrations of Jackson and of his Immediate Sue 
cessors. 

Andrew Jackson. 

The Spoils System. 

Nullification. 

Daniel Webster on Nullification. 

President Jackson in the Crisis. 

Nullification Ordinance by South Carolina. 

Bank Controversy. 

Election of 1832. 

Internal Improvements. 

Whigs and Democrats. 

President Van Buren. 

Panic of 1837. 

President Harrison. 

President Tyler. 

Quarrels. 

President Polk. 

Democratic Victory. 1845. 

XV. Foreign Affairs. 1815-1845. 

1. Relations with Spanish America. 

Florida Annexed. 

Reasons. 

Recognition of South American States. 

Their Independence Threatened. 

Two other Problems. 

' Alaska. 

Greece. 

Monroe Doctrine. 

Three Parts. 

Results. 

Panama Congress. 

Position of the United States. 

2. Other Questions in Foreign Affairs. 

Oregon. 

Claims of United States and England. 

Dr. Marcus Whitman. 


480 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


Texas. 

Settlement. 

War of Independence. 1836. 

“ Lone Star State.” 

Recognition. 

Presidential Contest of 1844. 

The Decision. 

Slavery in National Politics. 

XVI. Slavery and Territorial Expansion. 

1. Growth of the Slavery Issue. 

Slavery in the Declaration of Independence. 
Not condemned. 

After the War of Independence. 

Northern States. 

Southern States. 

In the Constitution. 

Missouri Compromise. 1820. 

The Compromise Line. 

The Abolitionists. 

The Liberty Party. 

Annexation of Texas Opposed. 

2. Mexican War and Territorial Expansion. 

Annexation of Texas Accomplished. 

War with Mexico. 

On the Rio Grande. 

Vera Cruz to Mexico City. 

New Mexico. 

California. 

Treaty of Peace. 1848. 

Oregon Annexed. 

Compromise with England. 

3. Review of Annexations. 1783-1848. 

4. Gold in California. 

XVII. Growth of the West. 

1. Communication and Transportation. 

Three Ways to the Pacific. 

Panama. 

Cape Horn. 

Great Plains. 

Oregon Trail. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


481 


Great Salt Lake Trail. 

Gold Seekers’ Trail. 

Sante Fe Trail. 

Old Spanish Trail. 

Great American Desert. 

Pacific Railroad. 

Completed after Civil War. 

Pacific Telegraph and Pony Express. 
Land Grant Railroads. 

Homestead Act. 1862. 

Gold and Silver Mines. 

Nevada. 

Colorado. 

Mormons. 

Beliefs. 

Utah. 

Petroleum in Pennsylvania. 

2. Farm and Factory Life. 

Inventions on the Farms. 

Labor-Saving Devices. 

Reaper. 

Cattle Ranches. 

A Factory Town. 

XVIII. Quarrels over Slavery in the Territories. 

1. Compromise of 1850. 

Plans to Control Slavery in Territories. 
Forbid Slavery there. 

Ordinance of 1787. 

Allow Slavery there. 

Compromise. 

Squatter Sovereignty. 

Compromise Adopted. 1850. 

California Free. For North. 

Fugitive Slave Law. For South. 

Utah and New Mexico left undecided. 
District of Columbia. No Slave Trade. 
$10,000,000 to Texas. 

Fugitive Slave Law. 

Excitement. 

Underground Railroad. 

Unde Tom’s Cabin. 


482 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


2. Kansas-Nebraska Act. Dred Scott. 

Provisions of Kansas-Nebraska Act. 
Squatter Sovereignty. 

3. Republican Party. 

“ Bleeding Kansas.” 

4. Dred Scott Decision. 

Slavery in Territories by Constitution. 

5. Lincoln-Douglas Debates. 

Effect on Lincoln’s future. 

Effect on Douglas’s future. 

6. John Brown’s Raid. 

The Excitement. 

Brown’s words. 

7. Arguments. 

Against Slavery. 

For Slavery. 

8. Presidential Contest of I860. 

Lincoln vs. Douglas. 

Lincoln’s position on Slavery. 
Arguments on Secession. 

For and Against. 

Tariff Issue. 

Lincoln's Victory. 

9. Confederate States of America. 

Secession accomplished. 

South Carolina Leads. 

New Constitution. 

Proposals from Northern Leaders. 
President Buchanan. 

Do Nothing. 

Horace Greeley. 

Let Them Go. 

Senator Crittenden. 

Compromise. 

Abraham Lincoln. 

No Compromise. 

No Slavery in Territories. 

Southern Leader. Jefferson Davis. 

No Compromise. 

For Secession. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


483 


XIX. The Civil War. 

1. First Year. 1861. 

Lincoln’s Firmness. 

Fort Sumter. 1861. 

The Bombardment. 

The Surrender. 

War Begun. 

Secession Completed. 

Fighting in the First .Year. 

Baltimore. 

Bull Run. 

Four Domestic Problems. 

Border States. 

Conservative Influence. 

The Mississippi. 

Invasion of the South. 

The Blockade. 

Three Problems in Foreign Relations. 
Foreign Trade with Confederacy. 

Foreign Recognition of Confederacy. 

The Trent Affair. 

Policy as to Slaves. 

Emancipation Sentiment Grows. 

2. Second Year. 1862. 

Monitor and Merrimac. 

New Era in Naval Warfare. 

Failure before Richmond. 

Victories in the West. 

Forts Henry and Donelson. 

On the Mississippi 
New Orleans. 

Emancipation. January 1, 186? 

No Recognition of the Confederacy. 

Impossible by England after Emancipation. 

3. Third Year. 1863. 

Chancellorsville. 

Gettysburg. Meade. 

Geographical Features. 

Northern Anxiety. 

Nature of the Fighting. 

Pickett’s charge. 


484 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


Vicksburg. Grant. 

Geographical Features. 

The Surrender. 

July 4th, 1863. 

Chattanooga. Grant. 

Geographical Features. 

Chickamaugua. 

Lookout Mountain. 

Missionary Ridge. • 

Knoxville. 

Blockade and Ocean Warfare. 

Alabama, etc. 

4. Fourth Year. 1864. 

Advance on Richmond. Grant. 
Petersburg. 

Shenandoah Valley Ruined. 

Three Victories. 

Mobile Bay Captured. 

Advance on Atlanta. Sherman. 

City Captured. 

March Through Georgia. 

Savannah. 

Lincoln Re-elected. 

5. Fifth Year. 1865. 

Sherman’s March Northward. 

Richmond Taken. Grant. 

Lincoln Assassinated. 

Cost of the War. 

XX. Political and Industrial Questions, 1865-1898. 
1. Reconstruction. 

End of Slavery. 

Thirteenth Amendment. 

Freedom. 

What to do with the Southern States. 
President’s View. 

View of Congress. 

Fourteenth Amendment. 

Fifteenth Amendment. 

Impeachment of the President. 
Carpet-baggers and Ku Klux Klan. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


485 


Use of Troops. 

Withdrawn. 1877. 

End of Reconstruction. 

2. Southern States in the Twentieth Century. 

National Progress Since 1865. 

A “ Million Dollar Seed.” 

Cotton Manufacturing. 

Diversification of Industry. 

Elberta Peaches. 

The Negroes and the Ballot. 

3. Finances and the Tariff. Ship Subsidy. 

Greenbacks. 

Free Coinage of Silver. 

Defeated. 1896. 

National Banks. 

Tariff. 

Action Under Seven Presidents. 

Ship Subsidies. 

4. Capital and Labor. 

Capital. 

Labor. 

Legislation against Organized Capital. 

5. Education. 

Progress. 

During Civil War. 

Women’s Colleges. 

Professional Education of Women. 
Federal Aid. 

Chautauqua Movement. 

Literary Activity. 

6. Settlement of the West. 

New States. 

Settlement of Oklahoma. 

Indians. 

7. Foreign Affairs. 

Alabama Claims. 

The French in Mexico. 

Purchase of Alaska. 

Monroe Doctrine. 

French Panama Canal. 

Venezuela Boundary. 


486 TOPICAL OUTLINE 

XXL War With Spain. 

1. Hostilities. 

Battleship Maine. 

Manila Bay. 

Santiago. 

2. Annexation of Territory. 

Porto Rico. 

Philippines. 

Hawaiian and Samoan Islands. 
Meaning of Annexation. 

Approval of Annexations. 

3. Three New Presidents. 

4. Development in the New Acquisitions. 
XXII. New International Questions. 

1. Peace Movement. 

First Congress at the Hague. 

Court of Arbitraton. 

Arbitration Treaties. 

Second Congress at the Hague. 

2. Pan-Americanism. 

Pan-American Congress. 

Pan-American Union. 

Panama Canal. 

Toll Question. 

Canal To-day. 

Venezuela Blockaded. 

Santo Domingo. Finances Supervised. 
Nicaragua and Hayti. 

Danish West Indies Annexed. 

Mexico. 

Near War. 

A. B. C. Mediation. 

3. Relations with the Far East. 

Japan and the Pacific Coast. 

China and the Open Door. 

Boxer Rebellion. 

Indemnity. 

Dollar Diplomacy. 

XXIII. Changes in Government. 

1. Capital and Labor. 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


487 


Control of the Trusts. 

Sherman Anti-Trust Act. 

Labor. 

Board of Mediation and Conciliation. 

Combination of Laborers not under Anti-Trust Law. 

2. Conservation. 

Reclamation Act. 1902. 

Forests and Mines. 

3. Four Amendments to the Constitution. 

National Income Tax. 

Popular Election of Senators. 

National Prohibition. 

National Woman Suffrage. 

4. Changes in the States. 

Initiative, referendum, and recall. 

Direct Primaries. 

Commission Form of Government. 

City Manager Plan. 

XXIV. The World War. 

1. Three Years of War. 1914-1917. 

Outbreak of War. 

Italy’s Choice. 

Belgium’s Fate. 

France’s Firmness. 

England’s Part. 

Germany’s Aims. 

House of Governors. 

Result after Three Years. 

2. United States as a Neutral. « 

Neutrality. Meaning. 

Acts not forbidden by Neutrality. 

Submarine Controversy with Germany. 

Trade Disputes with England. 

3. United States as a Belligerent. 

Germany’s Unrestricted Submarine Warfare. 

German Practices in America. 

Declaration of War. 

Many Discouragements. 1917. 

Bolshevists in Russia. 

Russian Peace with Germany. 


488 


TOPICAL OUTLINE 


Roumania Conquered by Germany. 

Italian Reverses. 

Encouragements. 

United States Joins the Allies. 

General Foch. Allied Commander. 
Jerusalem Captured. 

Germans Repulsed from Paris. 
Chateau-Thierry. 

Belleau Wood. 

St. Mihiel and Argonne Forest. 

Germany’s Allies Surrender. 

Bulgaria. 

Turkey. 

Austria. 

Italy’s Final Victories. 

The Armistice. 

4. Spirit of Service. 

Selective Draft. 

Care of the Soldiers. Welfare Organizations. 
Government Regulations. 

Liberty Loans. 

Relief Work Abroad. 

United States Shipping Board. 

Government Control of Railroads, etc. 

5. Treaty of Peace. 

Peace Conference. 

Immediate Problems. 

Germany. 

Her Colonies. 

Austria Dismembered. 

Turkey Pushed into Asia. 

Constantinople. 

Republic of Germany. 

League of Nations. 

Shall the United States Join the League? 
The Republicans. 

The Democrats. 

Republican Victory. 

President Harding. 

6. The Disarmament Conference. 



TOPICAL OUTLINE 


489 


XXV. Immigration and the New Citizenship. 

1. Immigrants. 

In Revolutionary War. 

Irish and Germans. 1848. 

In Civil War. 

Northern Europeans. 

Eastern and Southern Europeans. 
In World War. 

2. Immigrants in Industry. 

3. Restricting the Tide. 

Exclusion of the Chinese. 

General Restriction. 

Educational test. 

4. The New Citizenship 

Naturalization. 

Methods. 

Exceptions. 

Americanism. 





INDEX 


Adams, John, Second Continen¬ 
tal Congress, 148; 1783, 173; 
President, 197; peace with 
France, 205 

Adams, John Quincy, in 1820, 
259-260; elected, 259 
Adams, Samuel, life, 141; 
Second Continental Con¬ 
gress, 148 

Administration of Justice Act, 
139 

Agriculture, New England, 
122-123; in the South, 123- 
125; middle colonies, 125- 
126 

Alabama Claims, settled, 390- 
391 

Alaska, discovery, 242; pur¬ 
chase, 391-392; status, 402 
Albany Plan of Union, 105 
Alien Act, 197 

Alpaca, South America, 91-92 
American, nature, 113-114 
Americanism, meaning, 456 
Anderson, Major, Fort Sum¬ 
ter, 328-329 

Andre, British officer, spy, 
’ 165 

Animals, big game, 83-86; 
small fur-bearing, 78-91; do¬ 
mestic, 91-93 
Anti-Federalists, 195 
Apples, origin, 75-76 
Arbitration, progress, 404-405 
Argonne Forest, battle, 436 
Arizona, new state, 390 


Armada from Spain, destruc¬ 
tion, 27 

Armistice, terms, 438-439 
Arnold, Benedict, Canada, 149; 
traitor, 164-165 

Articles of Confederation, na¬ 
ture, 153; weakness, 179 
Assumption of State Debts, 
192 

Atlanta, captured, 358-359 
Atlantic Cable, 231 
Austin, Moses, Texas, 274 
Australia, New Holland, 36-37 


Balboa, discovery of Pacific 
Ocean, 13 

Baltimore, Lord, and Mary¬ 
land, 54 

Bananas, origin, 78 
Bank of the United States, 
first, 192; second, 265; from 
Civil War, 378 
Beaver, description, 87-88 
Bees, kinds and origin, 93 
Belgium, fate, 423 
Bering, Vitus, Alaska, 242 
Berries, origin, 76-77 
Birds, kinds, 94-95 
Bleeding Kansas, bloodshed, 
314 

Block, Adrian, voyages, 35 
Blockade, meaning, 203; griev¬ 
ance after 1793, 206; War of 
1812-1815, 212; 1861-1865, 

334, 335-356 


491 


492 


INDEX 


Boll Weevil, enemy of cotton, 
374 

Border States, loyal, 332 
Boston, settlement, 42-43; the 
massacre at, 138-139; Port 
Bill, 139; Tea Party, 139 
Bowie, James, Texas, 274 
Boxer Trouble, China, 412 
Braddock’s Defeat, 106 
Bragg, Braxton, General, Chat¬ 
tanooga, 355 

Brandywine Creek, battle, 158 
Breckinridge John C., nomi¬ 
nated, 1860, 319 
Brewster, William, Pilgrim 
leader, 40 

Brown, John, raid, 316-317, 336 
Buchanan, James, secession, 
321-322 

Buffaloes, early observed, 16; 
description, 84; paths in 
Kentucky, 121-122 
Bull Run, battle, 332, 339 
Bunker Hill, battle, 146-147 
Burgoyne, John, British gen¬ 
eral at Saratoga, 159-161 
Burke, Edmund, for concilia¬ 
tion, 140 

Cabot, John and Sebastian, 
voyages, 18-19 
Cabral, Pedro, voyage, 21-22 
Calhoun, John C., nullification, 
262; 1850, 309 

California, later Spanish voy¬ 
ages, 242-243; annexed, 287; 
gold, 291; trails, 295; free, 

311 

Canada, expedition against, 
149 

Capital, interests, 381; legisla¬ 
tion, 383 

Carolina, settled, 56 
Carpet-baggers, principles, 371 
Cartier, Jacques, voyages, 21 


Castine, held by British, 214 
Cats, origin, 93 

Catskill Mountains, Henry 
Hudson, 34 

Cattle, origin, 92; ranches, 
304-305 

Champlain, Samuel de, explora¬ 
tions, 32-33, 60 
Chattanooga, battle, 352-355 
Chautauqua movement, 386- 
387 

Cherries, origin, 77-78 
Chicago, Indian town, 102 
Chickens, origin, 95 
China, troubles, 412; dollar 
diplomacy, 412-413 
Chinese, exclusion, 453-454 
Chocolate, origin, 70, 82 
Clark, George Rogers, war, 
171-172 

Clay, Henry, 1820, 260; nullifi¬ 
cation, 264; Missouri Com¬ 
promise, 282; 1850, 310-311 
Coal, industry, 258 
Cocoa, origin, 70, 82 
Coffee, origin, 70 
Colleges for women, 385 
Colorado River, discovery, 17 
Colorado, new state, 388 
Columbia River, discovery', 
247 

Columbus, Christopher, mo¬ 
tives for voyage, 6-7; four 
voyages, 7-8; mistaken ideas, 
8-10; claim of Spain, 12 
Commission Form of Govern¬ 
ment, 420 

Compromise of 1850, 310-311 
Concord and Lexington, battle, 
144-146 

Confederate States of America, 
321 

Congress, powers, 184-185 
Connecticut, settlement, 44-45 
Conservation, progress, 416-417 



INDEX 493 


Constitution, convention, 181— 
186; compromises, 182-183; 
and Articles of Confedera¬ 
tion, 183-184; success, 185; 
method of adoption, 185-186; 
ten amendments, 195 
Constitution , victory, 210 
Contraband, in Washington’s 
time, 207 

Cook, James, voyages, 244-246; 

followers, 246-247 
Cooper, Peter, railroads, 228 
Cornwallis, Lord, British gen¬ 
eral at Yorktown, 169 
Coronado, Francisco de, ex¬ 
plorations, 17 

Cortereal, Gaspar, voyage,* 22 
Cotton, early cultivation, 71- 
72; manufacture, 255-256; 
gin; 258; seed, 373-374; 
manufacturing in Southern 
States, 374 

Cox, James M., candidate, 445 
Crittenden, John J., secession, 
322-323 

Crockett, Davy, Texas, 274 
Crown Point, fort, 107; sur¬ 
rendered, 159 

Cuba, 1898, 395; progress, 399- 
400 

Cumberland Road, 224-225 

Davenport, John, at New 
Haven, 45 

Davis, Jefferson, Confederate 
States of America, 321; se¬ 
cession, 324-325 
Davis, John, voyages, 26 
Deer, white-tailed, 86 
Delaware, founded, 58-59 
Democracy, Virginia, 31; New 
England, 46 

Democratic-Republicans, 195 
De Soto, and the Mississippi, 

16 


Detroit, fort, 172; surrender, 
212-213 

Dewey, George, New Orleans, 
342; Manila Bay, 397 
Disarmament, on Great Lakes, 
217; on the ocean, 446- 
447 

District of Columbia, 1850, 311; 

emancipation, 343 
Dogs, origin, 93 
Dominion of New England, 
history, 59 

Douglas, Stephen A., terri¬ 
tories, 313-314; 1860, 318 
Dover, founded, 45 
Draft, selective, 439 
Drake, Sir Francis, voyage, 
240-241 

Dred Scott Decision, 1857, 314— 
315 

Duquesne, Marquis, French 
governor, 104 
Dustin, Hannah, 100 

Eaton, Theophilus, New Ha¬ 
ven, 45 

Education, New England, 48; 
before 1861, 384; Civil War, 

384- 385; women’s colleges, 
385; professional for women, 

385- 386; federal aid, 386; 
Chautauqua Circles, 386- 
387; literary development, 
387 

Elk, description, 85-86 
Emancipation, 342-344 
Embargo, under Jefferson, 207 
England, claim to America, 18- 
20; early voyages, 24-32; 
rivalry with French in New 
England, 37-51; outside New 
England, 54-59; interest in 
colonies, 51; rivalry of Eng¬ 
land and France, 99-111; War 
of 1812-1815, 208-217; War 


494 


INDEX 


of 1914, 424M25; modern 

trade disputes, 430-431 
Erie Canal, 225-226 
Exeter, founded, 45 

Factory Towns, 305 
Fakers, geographical, 252 
Farragut, David G., Rear Ad¬ 
miral, 341; Admiral, Mobile, 
358 

Father Isaac Jogues, the Great 
Lakes, 60 
Father Kino, 242 
Father Marquette, the Missis¬ 
sippi, 62-63 

Father Raymbaut, the Great 
Lakes, 60 
Federalist, 186 
Federalists, 195 

Field, Cyrus W., Atlantic 
Cable, 231 

First Continental Congress, 

140-141 

Fish, kinds, 95-96 

Fishing, early Frenchmen, 21; 

colonial, 126 
Flag, new, 155-156 
Florida, 1763, 111; 1783, 173; 
annexation, 269 

Foote, A. H., Commodore, 340- 
341 

Foreign Trade, confederacy, 
334-335 

Fort Necessity, 104 
Forts, French, 102 
France, claim to America, 21; 
early voyages, 32; in the in¬ 
terior of America, 60-65; 
alliance, 161-162, 204; in¬ 
vasion, 424 

Franklin, Benjamin, Albany 
Plan of Union, 105; Second 
Continental Congress, 148; 
life, 158-154; in Revolution¬ 
ary War, 161; 1783, 173 


Freedmen, care, 369 
Fremont, John C., General, 
Mexican War, 288 
Frobisher, Martin, voyages, 
26 

Fruits, native, 74-78; imported, 
78-79 

Fugitive Slave Law, 311-312 
Funding the debt, 192 

Gadsden Purchase, from Mex¬ 
ico, 289 

Gage, Thomas, British general, 
Bunker Hill, 146 
Gama, Vasco da, voyage, 6 
Garrison, William Lloyd, aboli¬ 
tion, 283 

George III, character, 136-137; 

implacable, 149-150 
Georgia, settled, 59 
Germantown, battle, 158 
Germany, interests, 425; war, 
433-434; in peace treaty, 
443-444 

Gettysburg, battle, 346-350 
Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, voy¬ 
ages, 26 

Gold, California, 291 
Gold, Colorado and Nevada, 
301 

Goodyear, Charles, vulcaniza¬ 
tion, 83 

Gosnold, voyages, 37 
Government of colonies, na¬ 
ture, 129-131; local govern¬ 
ment, 132 

Grant, Ulysses S., Fort Donel- 
son, 340-341; Vicksburg, 352; 
Chattanooga, 353-355; Rich¬ 
mond, 357-358, 361-362; 

elected, 371 
Grapes, origin, 74-75 
Grasse, Comte de, comes to 
America, 163; in West Indies, 
169-170 


INDEX 


495 


Gray, Captain Robert, Colum¬ 
bia River, 247 

Great American Desert, extent, 

297 

Great Lakes, discovery, 33, 

60 

Great Plains, discovery, 17; 
the Jesuits, 62; transporta¬ 
tion, 293-294 

Greeley, Horace, secession, 322 
Greenbacks, money, 376 
Greene, Nathaniel, General in 
the South, 166-167 

Hamilton, Alexander, constitu¬ 
tional convention, 186; state 
debts, 193; life, 194 
Hancock, John, Second Conti¬ 
nental Congress, 148 
Harding, Warren G., President, 
445-446 

Harrison, William Henry, the 
Whigs, 266 

Hawaii, annexation, 397; 
status, 402 

Hayti, progress, 409-410 
Hearn, Samuel, explorations, 
248 

Henry, Patrick, orator, 141— 
142; Second Continental 
Congress, 148 

Hessians, Revolutionary War, 

157 

Holland, explorations, 33-37 
Homestead Act, enacted, 300- 
301 

Hooker, Joseph, General, Chat¬ 
tanooga, 354 

Hooker, Thomas, at Hartford, 
44-45 

Horses, origin, 92 
House of Burgesses, establish¬ 
ment, 31 

House of Governors, meaning, 

417 


House of Representatives, in 
1824, 260 

Houston, Sam, Texas, 278 
Howe, Sir William, British gen¬ 
eral, Bunker Hill, 147; Phila¬ 
delphia, 161, 163 
Hudson, Henry, voyages, 83- 
34 

Hudson Bay, settlement by 
England, 65 

Hudson River, discovery, 21; 

Henry Hudson, 34 
Hull, William, General, De¬ 
troit, 213 

Hussey, Obed, reaper, 303 

Immigration, eighteenth cen¬ 
tury, 115; attracted, 117; 
general, 449; Revolutionary 
War, 449; 1848, 449-450; 

Civil War, 450-451; Danes, 
Swedes, Norwegians, 451; 
Eastern and Southern Eu¬ 
rope, 451-453; World War, 
453; exclusion, 454-455 
Impressment, nature, 206-207 
Income Tax, amendment, 417— 
418 

Independence, gradual growth, 
150-151; declaration 151-152; 
justified, 152 

Indians, before Columbus, 1; 
in Mexico, 14-15; Peru, 15- 
16; Pequot War, 48; King 
Philip’s War, 48; trade, 126— 
127; under Washington, 221— 
222; Tippecanoe, 222-223; 
wards, 389 

Indian Corn, cultivation by 
Indians, 67-68 
Initiative, progress, 419 
Internal Improvements, Jack- 
son, 265 

Intolerable Acts, 139-140 
Inventions, forms, 302-303 


496 


INDEX 


Iron, industry, 258 
Italy, her choice, 423 

Jackson, Andrew, Indian 
fighter, 223; 1824, 260-261; 
nullification, 263-264; bank, 
264 

Jamestown, settled, 28-29 
Japan, relations, 411-412 
Jay, John, Second Continental 
Congress, 148; 1783, 173; 

Constitution, 186 
Jay Treaty, 204 
Jefferson, Thomas, Second Con¬ 
tinental Congress, 148; life, 
155; state debts, 193; Vice- 
President, 197; Virginia and 
Kentucky Resolutions, 198; 
President, 198-199; changes, 
200; man of peace, 207-208; 
Louisiana, 249-250; Declara¬ 
tion of Independence, 281 
Jesuits, activities in America, 
60-62 

Johnson, Andrew, career, 368; 

impeachment, 371 
Joliet, Louis, the Mississippi, 
62-63; description of the 
country, 63-64 

Jones, John Paul, naval war, 
170-171 

Kansas Nebraska Act, 1854, 
313; debate, 316 
Kaskaskia, 172 

Kearney, S. W., Commander in 
Mexican War, 288, 296 
Kelvin, Lord, Atlantic Cable, 
231 

Kendrick, Captain John, Col¬ 
umbia River, 247 
Kentucky, how reached, 120; 
buffalo paths, 121-122; early 
settlements, 122; state, 220 
King George’s War, nature, 103 


King William’s War, nature, 
99-100 

Knoxville, saved, 355 
Ku Klux Klan, principles, 371— 
372 

Labor, interests, 383; present 
status, 415 

Labrador, description, 20 
Lafayette, Marquis de, French 
general, 163 . 

Lake Champlain, discovery, 33; 

strategic value, 107 
Lake Superior, the Jesuits, 60- 
61 

La Salle, Sieur de, voyages, 64- 
65 

League of Nations, 444-446 
Lee, Robert E., Richmond, 
339; Gettysburg, 347 
Lemons, origin, 79 
Leon, Ponce de, fountain of 
youth, 13 

Lescarbot, Indian corn, 68 
Lewis and Clark Expedition, 
250-251 

Liberator, abolition, 284 
Liberty Loans, size, 441 
Liberty Party, 284 
Lincoln, Abraham, debate, 
316; nominated, 318-319; se¬ 
cession, 323-324; firmness, 
327; emancipation, 342-345; 
re-elected, 359-361; assassi¬ 
nation, 362-365 
Line of Demarcation, 12-13 
Literary Development, 387 
Llama, South America, 91-92 
London Company, charter, 28 
Long, Stephen, explorations, 
297 

Louisiana, purchase, 249-250 
Loyalists, 1776-1783; fate, 174— 
175 

Lynx, nature, 90 


INDEX 


Macdonough, Thomas, Cap¬ 
tain, Plattsburg, 211 
MacKenzie, Alexander, explo¬ 
rations, 248 

Madison, James, Constitution, 
186; President, 208; war with 
England, 208-209 
Magellan, Ferdinand, voyage, 
18 

Mahogany, origin, 80 
Maine, settled, 45-46 
Maine, battleship, 395 
Manager Plan, for cities, 420 
Manufacturing, colonial, 128- 
129 

Maps, Ptolemy, 2; Richard of 
Haldingham, 3; Columbus, 
10; Waldseemiiller, 11; 
Cabot, 14-15, 20; John 

Smith, 29 and 38; Cham¬ 
plain, 32; Hondius, 47 
Marietta, settled, 220 
Marshall, James W., gold, 291 
Marten, nature, 90 
Maryland, founded, 54-55 
Massachusetts, founded, 41- 
42; Government Act, 139 
May, Cornelius, voyages, 35 
McClellan, George B., General, 
332; Richmond, 339 
McCormick, Cyrus H., reaper, 
303-304 

McKinley, William, free silver 
record, 377-378; assassina¬ 
tion, 398 

Merrimac, ship, 337 
Mexico, conquest, 14; war with 
the United States, 287; peace, 
289; the French, 391; trou¬ 
bles, 410-411 
Mink, description, 90 
Minute Men, 144-145 
Mississippi River, discovery, 
16; French aggression, 100- 
102; 1861-1865, 334 


497 

Missouri Compromise of 1820 
282 

Mohawk Trail, 223-224 
Monitor, ship, 337 
Monroe, James, life, 259; 
Florida, 269 

Monroe Doctrine, origin, 270- 
272; French Panama Canal, 
392; Venezuela, 392 
Montana, new state, 389 
Montcalm, Marquis de, French 
general, 111 

Montgomery Richard, Canada, 
149 

Montreal, settled, 33 
Moose, description, 85 
Mormons, Utah, 301-302 
Morristown Heights, 157 
Morse, Samuel, telegraph, 230- 
231 

Muskrat description, 89 

Naturalization, early law, 197; 

present process, 455 
Navigation Laws, nature, 128 
Nebraska, new state, 388 
Negroes, ballot, 375 
Negro Suffrage, policy, 370 
Neutrality, Washington, 204; 

World War, 425-429 
Nevada, new state, 388 
New Amsterdam, early settle¬ 
ment, 3,5 

New England, early voyagers, 
37-38; settlement, 37-49; 
confederation, 46; democ¬ 
racy, 46; education, 48 
New Hampshire, founded, 45 
New Haven, founded, 45 
New Jersey, creation, 56 
New Mexico, annexed, 287; or¬ 
ganization, 311; new state, 
390 

New Netherland, founded, 35; 
capture, 55-56 


498 


INDEX 


New Orleans, battle, 215; cap¬ 
ture, 341 

New York, Henry Hudson, 34; 
New Amsterdam, 35; in 1717, 
116-117; held by British, 
156-157; re-occupied by Brit¬ 
ish, 164 

Niagara Falls, battles, 212 
Nicaragua, progress, 409 
Nicolet, Jean, the Great Lakes, 
60 

North Dakota, new state, 388 
Northmen, voyages, 3-4 
Northwest Passage, early 
searches, 25-26; John Smith, 
30; Henry Hudson, 33-34; 
further search, 50-51; 
through the Great Lakes, 
60 

Northwest Territory, won, 171— 
172; surrendered by British, 
204 

Nova Albion, 241 
Nullification, South Carolina, 
262 

Oglethorpe, James, Georgia, 59 
Ohio, French and British, 104; 

settlement, 220-221 
Oklahoma, new state, 389-390 
Open Door, China, 412 
Oranges, origin, 78-79 
Ordinance of 1787, provisions, 
180-181 

Oregon, claimed, 273; annexed, 
289-290; trails, 294 
Otter, land and sea, 90 

Pacific Ocean, discovery, 13; 

incorrectly located, 30 
Pacific Railroad, first, 298-299; 
second, 388-389 

Pacific Telegraph, completed, 
299 

Pan-American Congress, 406- 
407 


Pan-American Exposition, Buf¬ 
falo, 398 

Panama Canal, 407-408 
Panama Congress, in politics, 
272 

Panama Railroad, 293 
Panic, 1837, 265 
Paris, in war, 436 
Peaches, origin, 79; Elberta, 
374-375 

Penn, William, interests in 
America, 56-57 

Pennsylvania, settled, 56-57; 
petroleum, 302 

Perry, Oliver H., Commodore, 
Lake Erie, 210, 213 
Peru, conquest, 15-16 
Petersburg, siege, 358 
Petroleum, discovery, 302 
Philadelphia, founded, 57; 
colonial port, 116; First Con¬ 
tinental Congress, 140; 
Second Continental Con¬ 
gress, 148; captured, 157- 
158; abandoned by British, 
164 

Philippine Islands, free, 397; 
history, 401 

Pickett, G. E., General, Gettys¬ 
burg, 350 

Pierce, Franklin, elected, 313 
Pike, Zebulon, explorations, 
251 

Pike’s Peak, gold, 301 
Pilgrims, reasons for voyage, 
39-40; Plymouth, 39-41 
Pineapples, origin, 78 
Pitt, William, the elder, 137— 
138; the crisis, 140 
Pittsburgh, Fort Duquesne, 
104 

Plants, native, 67-73; imported, 
73-74 

Plattsburg, battle, 211 
Plymouth, settlement, 39-41 


INDEX 


Plymouth Company, Charter, 
28 

Political Parties, at first, 195 
Polk, James K., election, 267; 
Texas, 285 

Polo, Marco, voyages, 4 
Population, 1763, 113 
Pony Express, 299 
Porto Rico, annexation, 397; 

progress, 400-401; status, 402 
Portugal, claim to America, 21- 
22 

Portuguese, voyages, 4-6 
Potatoes, origin, 72-73 
Primaries, direct, 419-420 
Prince Henry the Navigator, 5 
Princeton, victory, 157 
Pring, Martin, voyages, 37 
Proclamation of 1763, nature, 
117-120 

Prohibition, amendment, 418 
Providence, settlement, 44 
Ptolemy, map of world, 2 
Public Lands, gifts, 231; sell¬ 
ing, 231-232; surveying, 232- 
233; making a farm, 233- 
234; on the prairies, 236-237 
Puritans, reasons for voyage, 
41-42 

Put-in-Bay, Commodore Perry, 

210 

Quakers, beliefs and persecu¬ 
tion, 58 

Quartering Act, 140 
Quebec, fall, 108-111; 140 
Queen Anne’s War, nature, 

100 

Quinine, origin, 82 

Races, 1763, 115-116 
Railroads, invention, 226-227; 
Pacific, 298-299; land grants, 
299-300; governmental con¬ 
trol, 443 


499 

Raleigh, Sir Walter, voyages, 
26-27; potatoes, 72 
Rats, origin, 93 
Recall, progress, 419 
Reclamation Act, 1902, 416 
Recognition, Confederate 
States of America, 335, 344- 
345 

Reconstruction, after 1865, 
369-370 

Referendum, progress, 419 
Relief, abroad, 441-442 
Republican Party, origin, 314 
Revere, Paul, ride, 144-145 
Rhode Island, founded, 43-44 
Rice, early cultivation, 72 
Richmond, 1861-1865, 331-332; 
McClellan, 339; capture, 361— 
362 

Rochambeau, Comte de, 
French general, 163 
Rodney, Sir George, English 
admiral, in West Indies, 169 
Roosevelt, Theodore, Presi¬ 
dent, 399 

Rosecrans, U. S., General, 335 
Rubber, origin, 83 

Samoan Islands, annexation, 

397 

San Francisco, founded, 1776, 
243 

Santa Fe, founded, 18; trail, 
296 

Santo Domingo, progress, 409 
Saratoga, surrender, 161 
Schools, colonial, 129 
Scott, Winfield, Mexican War, 
287 

Seals, Alaska. 91 
Secession, arguments, 319-320; 
initiated, 321; policies, 322- 
323; completed. 329-330 
Second Continental Congress, 
148 


500 


INDEX 


Sedition Act, 197-198 
Senators, election, 418 
Seven Years’ War, 103-111 
Shays’s Rebellion, 180 
Sheep, origin, 92-93; merino, 
258 

Shenandoah Valley, 1861-1865, 
358 

Sheridan, Philip H., General, 
358 

Sherman, William T., General, 
Chattanooga, 354; Georgia, 
358-359; march north, 361 
Ship building, colonial, 127 
Ship Subsidy, after Civil War, 
380 

Shipping Board, 442 
Silver, free coinage, 376-377 
Slater, Samuel, manufacturer, 
257 * 

Slave Trade, District of Co¬ 
lumbia, 311 

Slavery, in Virginia, 30-51; 
colonial, 125; cotton gin, 
258; Declaration of Inde¬ 
pendence, 281; emancipation 
movement, 281-282; Consti¬ 
tution, 282; Compromise of 
1820, 282; abolition, 283; 

Liberty Party, 284; Texas, 
285; control in territories, 
308-311; arguments against, 
317-318; for, 318; policy, 
336; abolished, 368 
Smith, Captain John, explora¬ 
tions, 29; and Champlain, 33- 
34; on coast of New Eng¬ 
land, 37-38 

Smith, Jedediah S„ explora¬ 
tions, 251; trail, 295 
Soldiers, care, 439-440 
South American Republics, 
recognized, 269 

South Carolina, nullification, 
263-264 


South Dakota, new state, 388 
Southern States, prosperity, 373 
Spain, claim to America, 6-18; 
jealousy of English settlers, 
31; early Pacific voyages, 
239-240 

Spoils System, meaning, 261 
St. Augustine, founded, 18 
St. Clair, Arthur, General, at 
Ticonderoga, 159-160 
St. Louis, colonial, 173, note 
St. Mihiel, battle, 436 
Stamp Act Congress, action, 
136 

Stamp Tax, nature and results, 
135-136 

Steamboat, beginnings, 229- 
234 

Stevens, John, railroad, 227 
Stockton, Commodore, Mexi¬ 
can War, 289 

Stowe, Harriet Beecher, book, 
312 

Submarine, controversy, 429- 
430; unrestricted, 432 
Sugar, early cultivation, 70-71 
Sugar Act, nature, 135 
Sumter, fort, 327-329 
Swine, origin, 92 

Taft, William H., President, 
398 

Tapioca, origin, 73 
Tariff, law of 1788, 188; begin¬ 
ning, 255; tariff of abomina¬ 
tions, 260; Civil War, 378; 
after Civil War, 378-380 
Taylor, Zachary, elected, 308 
Tea, origin, 70 

Telegraph, governmental con¬ 
trol, 443 

Tennessee, settlement, 120; 
state, 220 

Texas, revolution, 274-276; 
recognition, 278; election of 


INDEX 


501 


1844; 278; annexation, 285- 
286; 1850, 311 

The Hague, first congress, 404; 
arbitration, 404-405; second 
congress, 406 

Thomas, George H., General, 
Chattanooga, 354 
Three-cornered trade, 127 
Ticonderoga, fort, 107; sur¬ 
rendered, 146, 159-160 
Tippecanoe, battle, 222-223 
Tobacco, early America, 69-70 
Tomatoes, origin, 78 
Tories, in England, 138; south¬ 
ern states, 166 

Town meeting, 46; nature, 
132 

Townshend Acts, nature, 136 
Treaty of Paris, 1763, 111; 1783, 
173; 1898, 397; 1919, 443 
Treaty of Ghent, 215-217 
Trent Affair, right of search, 
335-336 

Trees, new, 80; imported. 80; 
California big trees, 80-82; 
forest products, 82-83 
Trenton, victory, 157 
Trusts, control, 415 
Turkeys, origin, 95 
Tyler, Vice-President, 266 


Uncle Tom’s Cabin, book. 312 
^Underground Railroad, slaves, 
312 


Utah, trails, 295; growth, 301- 
302; organization, 311 


Valley Forge, winter, 163 
Van Buren, Martin, election, 
265 

Vancouver, Captain George, 
achievements, 247-248 
Vanilla, origin, 82 
Vegetables, origin, 72, 74 


Venezuela, blockage, 408-409 
Verrazano, voyage, 21 
Vespucius, Americus, naming 
of America, 10 
Vicksburg, capture, 320-352 
Vincennes, 172 
Virgin Islands, annexed, 410 
Virginia and Kentucky Resolu¬ 
tions, 198 

Virginia, settlement, 28-31 


Waldseemiiller, Martin, nam¬ 
ing of America, 10-11 
War in Europe, 1793, 203 
Washington, George, journey 
to Ohio, 104-105; Braddock’s 
Defeat, 106; second Conti¬ 
nental Congress, 148; Com¬ 
mander-in-chief, 148-149; 
Boston, 149; New 7 York, 156; 
Valley Forge, 163-164; York- 
town, 168-169; Articles of 
Confederation, 180; first 
president, 188; Farewell Ad¬ 
dress, 197; election of 1820, 
249 

Washington, D. C., captured 
by British, 214; capital, 1861, 
331; new state, 389 
Watt, James, steam engine, 
227, 256 

Webster, Daniel, nullification, 
262 

West Indies, settlement by 
England, France, and Hol¬ 
land, 49 

Weymouth, voyages, 37 
Wheat, early cultivation, 73 
Whigs, in England, 138; origin, 
265-266; and Tyler, 266 
Whiskey Rebellion, 191 
Whitman, Marcus, and Oregon, 
274 

Whitney, Eli, invention, 258 


502 


INDEX 


Wilderness Road, to Kentucky, Woman Suffrage, amendment, 
120 418 

Williams, Roger, Rhode Island, Woolen Goods, manufacture, 
43-44 256 

Wilson, Woodrow, president, World War, 422-448 
399 Writs of Assistance, 134-135 

Wolfe, James, British general, 

108-109 


Yorktown, surrender, 167-168 





























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